


they say all good things have an end (so will it be heartbreak or death?)

by bottlefullofarsenic



Category: Fall Out Boy, Green Day, Halsey (Musician), Melanie Martinez (Musician), My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Depression, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, M/M, Maybe - Freeform, Minor Character Death, Multi, Panic Attacks, everything else is very small im sorry, i don't know how to write romance???, im just a small lil ace trying to make my way through the world, im sorry for the amount of tags omg, more tags to be added later, so please be kind, the main ships are breezy/dallon sarah/brendon and brallon, this is going to be the longest summary known to man jesus christ
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-22 18:55:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 33,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10703052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottlefullofarsenic/pseuds/bottlefullofarsenic
Summary: "Supernatural persons", that's their official title.Naturals for short, mostly because they can do things others can't, well, naturally. Some can go into someone's mind and pull out every thought and memory, some can make the ground shake and rocks spring from the ground, some can stay alive for centuries without aging one bit.They're hunted, hunted because they have powers while others don't. They're tracked down, or "detected" and put into the system, watched for their entire lives. The "Supernatural Identification and Detection Agency" is what they call themselves. Such a fancy name for an organization that really just spies into the lives of extraordinary people trying their best to live ordinary lives.Dallon Weekes is trying his best. He doesn't want to use his powers for "good or bad", he sure as hell knows that no one else in this place wants to either.All he really wants is to take a really, REALLY long nap, maybe eat a few bowls of cereal, and have the semblance of a  normal life with the rest of his friends.And then Brendon shows up, and it all goes to shit.





	1. part one (of course it didn't last)

**Author's Note:**

> so welcome to this funfest that i wrote in a week! (no i'm not kidding and i'm kind of scared of myself.) it's a superpower au, and it sprang out from a single prompt that got my mind all !!!! and so i started to type. idk how to write romance, by the way, so if all the couple-y scenes feel forced that's because i'm asexual and have never been in a relationship. i'm trying my best.
> 
> i tried to edit it to the best of my ability, but with 11.6k words, i gave up somewhere around the middle. a lot of the people in here are ooc (ooc? they're real people, so maybe oop ((out of personality)). idk man), but i've tried my best to make this as enjoyable as possible!
> 
> try to think of this as the happy chapter.

Brendon could now see why people liked camping.

 

He had never really had a liking for the activity, between the ill-fated trips in his childhood to the fact that he didn’t ever have the time to plan a trip. Who wanted to stay holed up in a tiny-ass tent in the middle of the wilderness, anyway?

 

But now the trees surrounding him had a sort of hypnotic beauty, the sound of the branches colliding together making a natural symphony, rising and falling with the swelling of the wind. In the distance he could hear a river, stream, whatever, and the sound of water hitting the rocks was strangely soothing.

 

Unfortunately, he was also bleeding out and trying desperately to keep conscious, so the surroundings took a backseat in his mind.

 

Priorities, you know.

 

Tripping over a stray rock, Brendon’s shoulder collided with the nearest tree trunk. Immediately, a nauseating pain rang throughout his body, combining with the fire-hot sensation of the wound in his stomach. Gagging, Brendon leaned on the trunk as his body tried in vain to expel what it didn’t even have in the first place.

 

It was then that his mind (unhelpfully) reminded him that he hadn’t drank anything in the last 24 hours, and eaten even less.

 

“Thank you, now fuck off,” he growled to himself, struggling to stand back up and continue to the sound of the river. He had started talking to himself about 5? 6? hours previous, right as he had woken up from a fitful sleep, but he had much more pressing matters to deal with.

 

For one, the stab wound in his stomach. That was pretty important.

 

Who would judge him, anyway? Brendon was fairly sure (even in his dehydrated, light-headed, delirious state) that there were no campsites within five miles of himself, and he hadn’t encountered any signs of life over than the occasional squirrel or bird. Then again, squirrels were judgemental fuckers.

 

He continued to the river, repeating the same phrase to himself over and over as he struggled forward.

 

It won’t last. It won’t last. _It won’t last._

 

Brendon was uncomfortably aware of his own mortality. He knew that even if he reached the river, the blood was dripping down into the pine needles faster than his body could replenish it. He was becoming dangerously delirious (hey, that’s good…) with dehydration and hunger. Even if the wound miraculously healed itself, the bacteria in the water would surely do the job.

 

‘ _To hell with it_ ,’ he thought, ‘ _it’s still water._ ’

 

His feet hit smooth rock, and he stumbled as he adjusted to the different surfaces. Black spots had appeared in his vision, but he could still see the river directly in front of him. He groaned in relief, stepping forward.

 

His stomach screamed in protest as he kneeled on the rock, bloodied hands staining the rocks and ragged skinny jeans steadily becoming wetter with each surge of the river. Brendon ducked his hands into the water, hissing at the cold but keeping them below the surface. He tentatively began to scrub the rust-colored stains off his fingers, before shovelling water to his face, drinking at such a pace that he got hiccups.

 

Now came the hard part.

 

Brendon had abandoned all kinds of caution long ago, but even then he carefully peeled off his shirt with shaking and numb fingers, not bothering to stifle his whimpers of pain as the fabric brushed against the slash in his stomach. There was absolutely no one around, which both relieved and saddened him. His chest tightened at the thought, and he immediately pushed it away. A panic attack wouldn’t help anything now.

 

He sneered at the leopard-print shirt as he let it wash downstream, out of sight; it only served to make him look good, but now it was beyond repair. He figured it wouldn’t really affect anything anyway, and now anyone that found his dead body could marvel over his _totally_ toned abs.

 

Taking a deep breath, he looked down at the source of pain. He immediately closed his eyes, cursing the man that had ambushed him one? two? days previous.

 

He wasn’t going to sugarcoat it to himself, convince himself that all would be okay. It looked like total shit. The area around the wound was a dark maroon, all dried blood and fuzz from the fabric of his shirt. It was still oozing blood, fat drops landing on the leg of his jeans and on the rock below him. The cut itself was ragged, the edges uneven and uncomfortably… _touching_ each other.

 

_Serrated blade_ , his mind supplied. Brendon didn’t know how he knew that.

 

A rustle of leaves behind him made him jump, almost falling into the river and pulling at the cut. He looked around fearfully, suddenly convinced that he wasn’t alone like he thought originally.

 

_Just a deer,_ he frantically thought. Images of the man who stabbed him lurked in the back of his mind, and he tried desperately to stop them - it was ludicrous, thinking that the guy had followed him into the ass-end of these giant woods just to finish Brendon off.

 

A twig snapped behind him; he whipped around completely.

 

Bad idea.

 

The water and its magical, healing qualities hadn’t affected him yet, and an overwhelming, sickening dizziness overtook Brendon. He fell forward, catching himself with shaky arms. They couldn’t hold his weight - he collapsed, directly onto his stomach. He couldn’t help the scream the turned into a high-pitched keening noise, as the rock dug into his cut.

 

Brendon passed out as soon as his head slammed against the rock.

-

If Joe could just _shut up,_ that would be fantastic.

 

“Gerard is probably just being paranoid, like usual… Patrick is the precognizant one, anyway, and he didn’t say anything was out here,” said complainer, well, _complained._ It seemed like instead of being telekinetic, Joe’s superpower was being able to drive anyone to madness with his whining.

 

Dallon honestly didn’t know why they picked him as the leader. He was withdrawn, quiet, prone to avoid conflict as much as he could. The only people he could think of that were quieter than him were Patrick and Ryan, and Patrick was his second-in-command while Ryan was their advisor.

 

Whatever.

 

He took a deep breath to calm his nerves, and avoid strangling Joe. It seemed Frank was in the same boat as him - the man was the same height as Patrick (as in, short), but Dallon wouldn’t put it past him to straight-up murder the taller man.

 

“Joe, it wasn’t just Gerard that said there were disturbances at the edges of the border. Plus, Patrick’s powers don’t work like that. He can see multiple instances of the future, and everything is affected by people’s decisions,” Dallon explained, which might’ve been the thousandth time he had.

 

They were nearing the river that cut directly through the territory, and it was probably Dallon’s favorite place; a calm, serene feeling just emanated from the water, and often times when the group was being insufferable he would walk alongside it, just listening to the trees, water and wildlife all interacting.

 

“We do border patrols all the time, anyway. So if you don’t shut up, I’m going to punch your face in, I swear to God -  “ Frank growled.

 

“Dallon! Frank is threatening me!” Joe immediately yelped, leaping away from the haemokinetic. Dallon had stopped paying attention, instead focusing on a new development at his feet.

 

Drops of blood.

 

His eyes travelled upward, blocking out the sounds of the bickering behind him. Chills ran down his spine as he saw a long streak of blood on a tree trunk.

 

He turned around, only to see Frank leap on Joe and Joe let out an ear-splitting scream.

 

“You two! Shut up, stop fighting, and come over here!” Dallon snarled, pointing at the ground in front of him like he was directing an errant child. Frank immediately slid off Joe’s back, and Joe put five feet’s distance between him and Frank.

 

“Holy shit, is that blood?” Frank immediately focused on the tree trunk, and Joe sobered, eyebrows furrowing in concern and stepping forward.

 

“They lead to the river,” Dallon informed them - the two nodded, and they began to follow the drops of blood like some kind of twisted trail of breadcrumbs.

 

While Joe was the serial complainer, Frank didn't seem to know the meaning of “quiet”. He was crashing through the bushes, and as they got nearer to the river Dallon had to scold him for being so damn _obvious_.

 

After that, the journey was almost peaceful.

 

“Wait, shit, I think I see someone - “ Joe stage-whispered, and Dallon clapped a hand over his mouth to emphasize that they had to be absolutely _silent_.

 

There was a figure kneeling at the edge of the river, desperately scooping water into his mouth like it was nectar of the gods. His obnoxious, leopard print t-shirt was stained heavily with blood on the left side of his torso, and there were other multiple slashes in it, probably from stray branches and thorns.

 

“What is he doing? Doesn't he realize that the water isn't safe to drink -” Frank was cut off by Dallon’s other hand covering his mouth. He was intently watching the guy, who started to take off his shirt.

 

The trio could hear his groans of pain as the fabric slipped over his head, and saw how he dangerously wobbled as he chucked the offending fabric into the river. Dallon shivered as he saw the cut in his side - it was short, but deep. He wondered how the guy had even survived for this long (his mind immediately reached a conclusion, but he refused it to be true).

 

Dallon silently motioned for Frank and Joe to follow him, and carefully picked his way over to an opening in the trees a few feet over.

 

Joe, not looking where he was going, crashed into a tree. The three froze, Dallon turning his head to glare at the telekinetic.

 

“Sorry,” Joe mouthed.

 

The guy at the river had startled, too, almost sliding into the river. He was looking around in fear, eyes wide and mouth slightly parted. They waited a moment as he calmed, turning back to the river after a minute.

 

Dallon continued, but not before aggressively putting a finger to his lips. Frank and Joe got the message.

 

And of course, he was the one to step on the damn twig.

 

At the sound, the guy at the river whipped around completely, before his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed, screeching as his stomach collided with the stones by the river.

 

A chorus of, “SHIT! FUCK!” erupted from the three as they sprinted over to the guy, abandoning caution immediately.

 

Dallon got to the guy first, his long legs serving him well. Rolling the injured man over carefully, he heard Joe gag at the wound in the guy’s torso and Frank whistle lowly.

 

“How did he even get here in the first place? Anyone with a cut that bad would've bled out a while ago,” Frank wondered as Dallon carefully slid his arms under the guy’s shoulders and knees, lifting him with some difficulty. It startled Dallon to see he was much lighter than he looked.

 

“I already have a few thoughts,” was the only answer Dallon gave before starting to walk back to the base. Joe and Frank gaped at him before exploding with questions.

 

“What the hell do you mean? He _cannot_ be one of us, the report that they send out to the public last year said they had ‘exterminated’ the rest of the Natural population,” Frank aggressively made quotation marks, lengthening his strides to walk alongside Dallon.

 

“They lie all the time, Frank, it's to make the normal public feel safe. Plus, they said that, but we’re still here. It's not a far stretch to say there's a few stragglers out there,” Dallon reasoned.

 

“Just because he didn't die from this doesn't mean he's a Natural, Dallon. Normal people can survive things like this,” Joe added.

 

“It's a known fact that we have an accelerated healing factor, even the normal people know it to ‘catch’ us,” Dallon continued tiredly.

 

Joe and Frank didn't let down, pummeling him with questions from both sides. The guy was a heavy weight in his arms, and Dallon was fairly sure blood was getting on his jacket (his stomach turned at the thought and unpleasant memories flooded his mind, but he ignored them to the best of his ability), but it didn't matter.

 

A few minutes later, the base was in sight, and Dallon was seconds away from dropping the man in his arms and punching both Joe and Frank in quick succession.

 

“I'm just _saying_ , if he was really a Natural, when he had collapsed his emotions would’ve surged and his powers would’ve reacted _because_ of that surge -” Joe was gesturing wildly, tripping over a branch but continuing to rant.

 

“What, were you expecting him to start floating or some shit?” Frank spat.

 

“Maybe!”

 

Dallon groaned.

 

The gods, actually listening for once, seemed to decide to bless him in the form of the 5’5” man known as Josh Dun.

 

“Hey Dallon - woah, wait, who is _that_?” the healer’s voice called his attention to the entrance of the base, cutting off Joe and Frank’s bickering. They all looked to see the short man walking hurriedly over to them, highlighter yellow hair moving wildly with his movement, and glittering smile transforming into a concerned expression.

 

Josh ran over to check the guy out, and Dallon uncomfortably lowered him so that Josh could get to him easily.

 

“Jesus, that's a horrible cut… where’d you find him?” Josh mumbled, running his fingertips over the ragged edges of the wound. Almost immediately, it stopped bleeding.

 

“By the river. I'm guessing he was dehydrated, he was really going at it when we saw him,” Dallon replied, and Josh gave him a startled look.

 

“He was drinking really frantically, dude.” Joe rubbed his eyes when he realized what Josh had taken Dallon’s words as; Dallon himself had blushed, and now his cheekbones were a perfect pinkish color.

 

“We need to get him to the medical room, then, just so I can assess how really far gone he is,” Josh continued, recovering from his shock.

 

Dallon nodded, and Joe and Frank took that as a sign to walk into the base on their own, resuming their argument as well.

 

As soon as Dallon and Josh walked in, they were spotted by Patrick and Ryan. They rushed forward, Patrick’s eyebrows furrowed in concern and Ryan looking like he saw a ghost, wide eyes fixed on the man in Dallon’s arms.

 

“What happened?” was the first thing out of Patrick’s mouth, but before Dallon could relay his story again Josh interrupted.

 

“He’d really love to tell you, but unfortunately this man here is bleeding out and unconscious, so we really have to get going.” With that, Josh pushed Dallon away from a bewildered Patrick and Ryan, towards the doors of the medical room.

 

“You really didn't need to do that -” Dallon tried, but Josh hushed him as he cleared a bed in the medical room and motioned for Dallon to lay the guy down.

 

“Yes I did, you were going to dawdle and dawdling equals death,” Josh said shortly. Normally he was very laid back and friendly, but when there was an emergency like this, his demeanor changed to commanding and leader-like. Dallon sort of admired him for it, actually.

 

He watched as Josh reached into the guy’s front pocket, pulling out a wallet and lighter. Dallon suddenly felt stupid - he could've easily found out who this guy was if he had just stopped and looked before acting.

 

“Let’s see… Brendon Boyd Urie, 23, this is a Nevada driver’s license,” Josh rattled off, pulling a battered-looking card out of the wallet. Dallon kept the name in his mind as he looked at the guy, Brendon’s, face. It fit him. He had high cheekbones, a prominent jaw, wide nose, plump lips and strong eyebrows.

 

“Hey, look through the rest of his stuff while I hook him up to an IV,” Josh’s voice cut through Dallon’s thoughts, and the shorter man shoved the wallet into Dallon’s hands before rushing away.

 

“Isn't that invasive and sort of illegal?” Dallon called after him. A snort was his only answer.

 

“Whatever,” he grumbled, opening the wallet and rifling through it. A hundred, two twenties and eight ones. A credit card, actually two credit cards. A museum membership card, a Supernatural Identification and Detection Agency identification card, a gift card to Target… wait, _what_?

 

Dallon almost dropped the contents in his hands as he frantically pulled the innocent white card out of its designated sleeve.

 

**THE SUPERNATURAL IDENTIFICATION AND DETECTION AGENCY (SIDA)**

 

**NAME:** BRENDON BOYD URIE

**DOB:** APRIL 12, 1994

**SEX:** M

**ABILITY TYPE:** TELEPATHY

**YEAR OF DETECTION:** 2005

 

“Josh, when you have a second, come over here.” Dallon’s voice seemed strangely far away, disembodied, as he stared at the card. Slowly reaching behind him, Dallon pulled his own wallet out of his back pocket and from there, his own SIDA card.

 

**THE SUPERNATURAL IDENTIFICATION AND DETECTION AGENCY (SIDA)**

 

**NAME:** DALLON JAMES WEEKES

**DOB:** MAY 4, 1987

**SEX:** M

**ABILITY TYPE:** EMPATHY

**YEAR OF DETECTION:** 2009

 

“What is it - is that a SIDA card?” Josh grumbled before running forward, expression changing from annoyance to intrigue.

 

“Yeah.” Dallon let the card be ripped from his hand as Josh inspected it, and he did the same as Dallon had - took out his own SIDA card and compared the two.

 

“It looks legit,” Josh said finally. He had hooked Brendon up to a heart-rate machine and an IV, and the steady beeping filled the room.

 

“It's totally legit. But the thing is, why haven't we heard of him before? There's only a handful of us out here,” Dallon asked, and Josh shook his head before giving it back to Dallon.

 

“I don't know, but right now I'm going to focus on actually healing the guy so he can give us his answers,” Josh replied, walking back to where Brendon was on the hospital bed, pale face and heart rate monitor steadily beeping.

 

Dallon took that as his chance to exit, glancing back before leaving the room.

 

-

 

This was _certainly_ not the river.

 

Brendon barely woke up before sitting up immediately , the surface beneath him suspiciously comfortable, his stomach feeling suspiciously fine, and Brendon himself being suspiciously _alive_.

 

Just as he suspected.

 

Instead of bleeding out on a riverbank, severely dehydrated and starved, he was in a light grey room, empty cots lining the walls on either side of him. They were all empty, except the one he was currently in, but miscellaneous items littered the beds. He could see errant clothes, bandages, syringes, and… were those _drumsticks?_

 

Looking to his left, Brendon was greeted by the sight of a heart rate monitor and IV drip. Good, good, things to make him _not_ dead. He nodded appreciatively to the two devices (it seemed the tendency to talk to himself had transformed to talking to inanimate objects. he had to fix that), before looking to his right.

 

He screamed.

 

There was a _dude_ sitting there, _looking_ at him. He looked like he would be tall as shit when he stood up (long ass legs, seriously), and he had hair like Brendon but darker brown, almost black. He had a slightly crooked nose, like someone had broken it and it healed weirdly, and these really deep blue eyes that he was currently using to _fucking stare at Brendon why was he sitting there focusing on his damn eyes?_

 

“I swear to fuck you weren’t there before,” he stammered, remembering he could speak aloud. The dude raised an eyebrow in amusement? contempt? fuck, man, he had no idea. If reading people was like reading a book, Brendon was fairly sure he would fail Emotion English class.

 

“I’m pretty sure fuck isn’t a god you can swear to,” the dude replied in a flat, monotone, sarcastic tone. Brendon huffed in reply, falling back and turning his face away from the dude. Okay, dude who was looking at him, make fun of him all you want. Brendon doesn’t mind, _at all_.

 

“Don’t get huffy at me, please. If you’re going to stay here, I’d prefer we be on good terms,” the dude tried again, this time with a nicer tone. Brendon almost fell for it.

 

Almost.

 

“What do you mean, _stay here_ ?” Brendon asked, this time with less of an accusatory tone. Or so he thought. Again, he wasn’t that eloquent in the whole _emotions_ thing. But if the dude was making an effort, he supposed he should do the same. He was most likely the reason Brendon wasn’t dead, anyway.

 

“You’re a Natural.”

 

Brendon whipped his head around, eyes wide as he stared at the guy again. The dude had the credit to look slightly guilty, rubbing the back of his neck and _finally_ looking away from Brendon.

 

How the actual _fuck_ did he know that? Wait…

 

Brendon’s focus switched to the front pocket of his jeans; he frantically patted his jeans, and his panic grew. No wallet.

 

He looked back at the guy, who had all of a sudden pulled Brendon’s wallet out from thin air, his ass, who even knows? Brendon grabbed at it, but the guy frowned again and drew it away.

 

“That’s my goddamn _wallet,_ that’s _mine,_ ” Brendon snarled, and he was startled to discover that he was blinking back tears, and there was a lump forming in his throat. He was getting too worked up.

 

“I’m sorry, but when you collapse on my territory, and I have to carry you all the way back here and use some very valuable supplies, I think I’m entitled to know who you are -” the dude started, exasperated. Brendon cut him off.

 

“Your _territory_? What are you, some kind of animal?” Brendon spat. The dude didn’t look impressed.

 

“You know perfectly well what I am.” The dude’s voice had gone back to the flat, monotone it had been when he started talking to Brendon, but the sarcasm had left.

 

Shit. _Shit._

 

There was a very long, very awkward pause while Brendon tried to collect his thoughts. When he started getting panicky like this, the cap he kept _very firmly on his powers, he hadn’t had a slip-up in three years thank you very much_ started to loosen, and everybody’s thoughts just kind of… _overwhelmed_ him.

 

“Anyway, you’re avoiding something,” the dude said - wait, wait, this was annoying, Brendon couldn’t keep referring to him as _the dude_.

 

“What’s your name? I can’t keep calling you the dude in my mind, it’s very vague and I’m getting confused,” Brendon blurted, and the dude’s (stop it! what was his name!) eyebrows shot up.

 

He stared at Brendon, and Brendon stared back, steadily getting more and more panicky.

 

After a minute, Brendon opened his mouth to ask again (did he forget that brendon asked him? brendon had that problem a lot, and he knew it got annoying, to not even know what someone asked you literally three seconds ago), but the dude answered before he could get anything out.

 

“Dallon,” was all he said flatly, and Brendon nodded gratefully, thanking him.

 

Manners were important.

 

“Anyway, _Dallon_ ,” Brendon started again, emphasizing his name. Dallon didn’t look impressed, “Yes, I do know what you are. It’s just…”

 

Here it was. _Of course,_ his mind wouldn’t let him vocalize his thoughts!

 

Typical!

 

Fantastic!

 

He _really_ hated himself!

 

Brendon let out a frustrated noise and hit himself in the forehead - Dallon startled, straightening up and eyes widening.

 

“You good?” he hesitantly asked Brendon, who weakly waved him off.

 

“... words are hard,” he finally said as an explanation, and _thankfully_ Dallon understood. Or at least he thought. Again, Brendon was at about 5% emotion literacy here.

 

“ _Anyway_ , I'm trying to say that I was stabbed because of being a Natural… so I'm not about to go around I'm announcing I'm one or confirming rumors.” Brendon rubbed at his forehead, wishing that for once his mouth and mind would actually _cooperate._

 

“Who stabbed you? How did you even get in here?” Dallon immediately asked, flat tone spiked with intrigue and concern (or so brendon thought. it sounded nice in his mind, anyway).

 

Brendon shrugged. “I don't know, he was tall, taller than me anyway, and he… I don't know, stabbed me? There isn't much more to it. I was just stopping here for a rest stop, you know, but then he cornered me, I was like, ‘Dude, who even are you?’ and then…” he gestured to his stomach (it was bandaged, he hadn't noticed that before, and it felt exponentially better) to finish his story.

 

Dallon seemed to be thinking hard on his story. Brendon nervously rubbed his hands on his jeans, and startled when Dallon spoke up again. _God,_ his nerves were shot.

 

“I'm fairly convinced you aren't lying. Back to your first question, you're staying here because this is something of a Natural sanctuary. We're far away from any kind of prying eyes, government or normal people,” Dallon explained, absent-mindedly running a hand through his hair.

 

“There are more of us here?” Brendon immediately asked, then winced at Dallon’s following expression (was that rude? he couldn't tell. goddamn his limited emotion vocabulary god fucking FUCK).

 

“Yeah, excluding me there’s about… 18? Not a lot in terms of population, but -” Dallon was cut off by Brendon’s amazed exclamation.

 

“That's the most I've ever heard of!” He said frantically, calming down slightly when he saw Dallon’s amused expression, “Even when I was in, like, a Natural ‘group’ for the entire state of Nevada, there was about 5 of us.”

 

Brendon was flooded by memories after that, thoughts of his old friends (kenny and dan playing board games with him, spencer offering a mutual shoulder to cry on whenever something happened, jon excitedly showing him music he had written all throughout high school, ryan steadily becoming more than _just friends_ , the two becoming ryanandbrendon before, well…).

 

“Could I ask who?”

 

“Uh…” Brendon shook away the memories, focusing again on the conversation.

 

“There was just me and my friends, Ryan, Spencer, Jon, Kenny, and there was also Ian and Brent… but I know for sure that those two were captured by hunters.” Brendon shuddered at the thought, immediately forcing it back into the cage he had constructed for unpleasant memories years ago, “I haven’t heard from any of the others in years, and after a while I became convinced they were captured too,” Brendon finished, before seeing a strange look on Dallon’s face.

 

Okay, Brendon _definitely_ had no idea what that emotion was.

 

“They couldn't have been Ryan Ross, Jon Walker, Kenny Harris, and Spencer Smith, could they?” Dallon’s eyes were sparkling.

 

Brendon gaped at him.

 

“You can't mean… what the… I thought they were dead?” he whispered. Dallon smiled, the first time in this whole conversation.

 

“Definitely not dead. You weren't wrong, though, hunters almost got Spencer and Jon. They were in a much worse state than you were when they got here. Ryan and Kenny had to basically carry them in,” Dallon said nonchalantly, and before Brendon could reply he got up, brushed off his pants and started to walk to the doors at the far end of the room.

 

Brendon had been right; he was tall as fuck.

 

Wait - where the hell had _that_ come from?

 

“Get some rest. Josh told me you're not completely healed yet, and I want you to be 100% before you meet the others. Also, eat that sandwich. I can hear your stomach from here.” As if on cue, Brendon’s stomach grumbled, and Brendon looked to the right again; a sandwich was sitting there. He was almost 100% sure that _hadn’t_ been there before.

 

Looking back at the door, Brendon saw that Dallon had left, letting the door quietly click shut behind him.

 

Brendon was fairly sure he had never been this confused in his life.

 

-

 

Dallon barely knew the guy and already his emotions were so… _overwhelming_.

 

Confusion was rolling off of Brendon in such powerful waves that Dallon could barely hold back a wince, and Dallon wasn't a telepath, but he could almost _hear_ the confused screaming in Brendon’s head.

 

It wasn't just the overpowering confusion, though - there was also a stifling sense of panic, a suffocating blanket of hostility, and there was a mixture of strange, unnamed emotions that made it hard for Dallon to breathe in completely.

 

He almost ran headfirst into Ryan as he rounded the corner; his advisor sidestepped, colliding with the wall awkwardly.

 

“Oh - sorry,” Dallon stammered, dragging himself out of his thoughts. Ryan looked just as flustered, cheeks slightly pink as he rubbed his shoulder awkwardly.

 

“No, it's good. How was your, uh, conversation with Brendon?” Ryan asked. After Dallon looked at him in confusion, he rushed to elaborate, “I was just going to talk to him.”

 

“He’s pretty high strung. Really anxious, my heart is beating twice as fast as it usually is from about ten minutes conversation with him,” Dallon sighed, before thinking back on said conversation, “You were friends with him when you were younger, right?” Ryan looked surprised, but then quickly recovered.

 

“Uh, yeah. We were pretty good friends. I mostly hung around Jon, though. Spencer was much better friends with him.” There was something Ryan wasn’t telling him, something he has hiding. Dallon wasn’t about to pry, though; he knew that Ryan got snappish and mean when he felt cornered, and he had already been yelled at enough by Brendon.

 

“Good luck, I guarantee that you’re going to be exhausted by the end of it,” Dallon said instead, patting Ryan on the shoulder as he started to walk again. Ryan let out a sort of awkward burst of laughter, thanking Dallon as he walked away.

 

Dallon quickly fell back into musing about Brendon’s emotions; he had to reach out his powers, as he was further away from the man now, but they were still as strong as before (except the sharp knife of hunger in his stomach had been sated, dallon noticed with satisfaction). After a moment, a spike of anxiety and confusion rose as Dallon guessed that Ryan had walked through the door, then immediate disbelief and… was that _fury_?

 

He swiftly untangled himself from the net of Brendon’s emotions. He had no place to be witness to Ryan and Brendon’s interactions, even if it was just through feelings. He expected everyone to respect his privacy - he didn’t want to be hypocritical.

 

Turning the corner, Dallon was greeted with the sight of Frank and Joe, arguing yet again. About the same subject as yesterday, too. Dallon sighed loudly. They couldn’t let it rest, could they?  


“Joe, I am one hundred fucking percent sure that he is a Natural, why else would Patrick and Dallon agree to let him stay?” Frank snapped, and the taller man aggressively shrugged.

 

“I don’t know, maybe because he was close to death? You know those two, they’re the nicest goddamn people in this hellhole. _I’m_ one hundred fucking percent sure that they would save any damn thing, even if it was a fucking bumblebee,” Joe snarled back.

 

“Hey! I'll have you know, the bumblebee population is declining at an _exponential_ rate, and I admire Dallon and Patrick for doing their part in saving the bees -” Dallon cut Frank off with his laughter.

 

Both of them settled into an uncomfortable silence as Dallon laughed to the point of tears, holding his sides.

 

“Are you two… angrily complimenting Patrick and I about _saving_ the _bees?_ ” Dallon gasped, wiping the tears from the corners of his eyes.

 

“... I guess,” Joe said in a surly tone, but with such a whiny tone that Dallon started to laugh again.

 

“I'm sorry. Please continue,” Dallon waved them off, quickly walking between the two.

 

As expected, the duo immediately started to spit insults at each other as soon as they thought he was out of earshot.

 

Dallon continued to giggle at random intervals (he hadn't laughed in such a long time, and now his stomach muscles ached from being unused to the action), and he earned a strange look from Josh as he passed by.

 

He pushed the door to the entertainment room open. Everyone was in there, either messing around with the few instruments they had, playing pool or table tennis, or sitting around the TV while bass-heavy music pounded through the speakers.

 

Kenny, Jon, Dan and Spencer were sat in a circle, playing what looked like a pretty vicious game of Uno, while Gerard was trapped under the entire weight of Mikey a few feet away, the younger Way scrolling casually on his phone (dallon wasn't going to ask). Josh and Andy were having a drum battle (which seemed pretty impressive, seeing as they only had one, severely beat-up drum kit), and Tyler was singing loudly out of tune while banging out what sounded like “Under Pressure” on the piano. Patrick and Pete seemed to be judging the performance (they were both sitting on the pool table, cross-legged), calling out a few tips here and there. Ray was the only one that seemed to be doing something productive; he was sat on the ground by Gerard and Mikey, reading through a thick textbook and writing things down periodically (dallon recognized the textbook, it was the entire history of the rise of their current government. how ray had the capacity to concentrate on that, dallon didn't know).

 

Everything was normal, then.

 

There was a chorus of “Hey Dallon!” from the group, and quite a few gave him strange looks.

 

What was it this time?

 

“Dude, did the new recruit, like, tape your face into that shape?” Pete called, and Dallon frowned. Immediately there was a groan from the others, and Dallon was buffeted by a wave of disappointment.

 

“What?” he asked innocently, and Patrick reached over, smacking the back of Pete’s head. Pete yelped.

 

“That was the first time I've seen Dallon smile since last July, and you ruined it!” Patrick yelled, but it was clear he was more teasing than being serious.

 

“It looks like the new guy is worth it, then,” Billie yelled from where he was strumming away on his old, marked-up blue guitar simply named ‘Blue’, Tré next to him banging on a makeshift drum kit (some buckets, a metal bowl and some extra cymbals, but somehow he was making it sound good) and Mike plucking random notes on a beat-up bass.

 

“No, no, it wasn't Brendon. It was Frank and Joe, they -” he cut himself off, laughing again.

 

Pete looked like he just saw the birth of a unicorn-pegasus hybrid.

 

“They, were fighting, and the subject for some reason changed to Patrick and I’s leadership, and -” he cut himself off again, this time with an ugly snort. He held a hand over his mouth for a sold thirty seconds, shaking with laughter.

 

“It's so beautiful!” Gerard squeaked from under Mikey, voice about an octave higher than it normally was and _much_ nasally-er (was that a word?), and it was the last straw.

 

Dallon leaned against the pool table, his shoulders violently shaking with laughter as he gasped. Kenny crowed triumphantly from where he was playing Uno, smiling over at Dallon. Pete and Patrick looked at each other in awe; through his tears he saw Tyler, Josh and Andy do the same.

 

Of course it didn’t last.

 

He shot up as the door behind him slammed suddenly, his eyes watering and still smiling brilliantly (he didn’t notice as billie snapped a picture, shoving his phone back into his pocket as quickly as he could).

 

Ryan was storming in, eyes ablaze and hands in fists. The grin slid off Dallon’s face; there were no groans of disappointment like before, and yet there was a sense of staleness. Monotony. Emptiness where it had been temporarily filled by the warmth of laughter.

 

Back to being the leader, the one to figure it all out.

 

“I don’t miss their arguments,” Spencer muttered to Jon, who only nodded sadly and dealt Ryan Uno cards as the agitated geokinetic sat down next to him. Ryan nodded gratefully at his old friend, no longer looking like he wanted to punch someone’s face in but still sullen and unsmiling.

 

Dallon wondered if that was what he looked like.

 

Conversations resumed (dallon hadn’t noticed that it had gone silent in the time that ryan had walked in, but he wasn’t surprised) and Dallon straightened up, awkwardly clearing his throat, brushing tears from his eyes and looking at the moisture on his fingertips in a sort of detached contempt.

 

“I’ll have to go and talk to Brendon again, he can’t go and make trouble with people if he’s going to stay.” Dallon’s voice sounded eerily calm, a stark contrast to the giggling mess he was just moments before. He started to walk to the doors, but there was a flurry of activity behind him - he turned slightly as Patrick caught up to him, panting.

 

“Dallon -” Patrick gasped, and Dallon raised an eyebrow. The shorter man searched for the right thing to say for a moment, before sighing at looking up at Dallon with a mixture of pity and understanding in his eyes, “... don’t tire yourself out.”

 

Patrick was in the same exact position as Dallon. He knew just as well that there wasn’t time for laughing over a comment in passing, or messing around with old and stolen instruments, or gathering together to play board games.

 

They both knew this was a pretty little lie, and it wasn’t going to last.

 

-

 

Brendon was buzzing with fury and anxiety as Ryan stormed out of the room, glaring daggers into the back of his old friend’s (ex-boyfriend, actually, but that didn’t matter) head.

 

Unlike much of their previous arguments over the years, it was a serious thing they were fighting over (ryan never attempted to _tell_ brendon that he and the rest were alive, and so brendon had gone through most of his life living in fear that he would, too, be killed. ryan tried to defend that it was too dangerous to contact brendon - _dangerous?_ brendon had screamed at him, _you don’t get to talk about dangerous when i cried myself to sleep every fucking night thinking that i had lost you forever! thinking that i was going to be caught and be killed too! you don’t get to talk about dangerous,_ and that was when ryan had left, red in the face and angry tears in his eyes. it was the same, always the same), and Brendon felt the familiar tightening in his chest whenever he got stressed.

 

Attempting to control his breathing, Brendon searched for the lighter he always carried with him. Many assumed that he smoked from the device that was always in his pocket, but they never bothered to think that maybe, just _maybe_ , it calmed him down. Seeing it on the bedside table, he reached over and flicked it on.

 

The clicking noise immediately had its affect on him, efficiently calming him and he could feel the pressure lightening slightly.

 

Slightly.

 

The door opened again, and Brendon startled, dropping the lighter. It clicked off just as it hit the ground, too far away for Brendon to reach. The feeling came back, this time with daggers of breathlessness piercing his lungs. It was just Dallon, but he still couldn’t breathe properly.

 

“Dallon -” he choked out, the terrifyingly familiar sense of dread creeping up on him. He had been avoiding a panic attack for the past two days; he knew that eventually he would have to let it run its course, but not with _this_ asshole there (somewhere in the back of his mind, it reprimanded him for calling dallon an asshole, but really, the panicking side of his mind was far too busy to give a shit). Tears were pricking at his eyes, and sobs were obstructing his throat as he was trying _so hard_ to breathe.

 

Dallon looked up, his “everything is boring” expression morphing into one of concern, fear, pity, _whatever, Brendon was having a panic attack he really couldn’t fucking decipher emotions right now-_

 

“Hey, hey, are you okay..?” Dallon trailed off. Brendon snorted, immediately regretting the action because it dispelled the air he _really_ didn’t have right then.

 

“Perfectly peachy,” Brendon managed in a flat monotone (lookie here, dallon! it’s one of your moves!), before a sob bubbled up and escaped from his throat, releasing a wave of tears with it. Absolutely fucking _great_.

 

He doubled over, covering his face to hide it from Dallon (like that would do anything, but it was a reflex from when he used to have panic attacks alone in the bathrooms at school, so fucking sue him), trying to stifle his panting.

 

There was a sudden weight by his legs, and Brendon flinched away as a hand came down on his back.

 

“Sorry,” Dallon mumbled, pulling his hand back _just_ as Brendon was getting used to comforting weight.

 

“NO -” Brendon let out a strangled protest, lifting his head slightly - Dallon got the message, putting his hand back on Brendon’s back.

 

Brendon focused on the pressure, tying himself to it. It wasn’t _quite_ enough, but he was _fairly_ sure Dallon would be more than uncomfortable if Brendon laid on him like he used to do with Ryan -

 

Brendon squeezed his eyes shut as he thought of Ryan, his anxiety spiking again and his chest suddenly feeling like it might collapse if he didn’t do something right then.

 

So he went with his gut feeling.

 

Dallon jumped as Brendon surged upward, practically _gluing_ himself to the taller man. He immediately buried his face in Dallon’s neck, focusing on Dallon’s breathing.

 

Dallon himself had stiffened, but he gradually relaxed, slow enough that Brendon could also adjust to the softness. His hands came up to wrap around Brendon’s torso, but by that time Brendon had controlled his breathing and gotten his head back (honestly, the only thing keeping brendon attached to dallon was the fear of seeing dallon’s face).

 

They sat there for what seemed like years, but might’ve been a few minutes (oh, so original. give him some slack, okay? he would be more creative with the metaphors after his heart stopped beating like a bird that was trapped in a cage, thank you very much), and after Brendon felt like his heart had stopped trying to jump out of his chest, he tried to move his face from Dallon’s neck.

 

Tried.

 

Dallon had buried his own face into Brendon’s hair, and Brendon could faintly feel Dallon’s nose smushed against his scalp, his breathing stirring Brendon’s brown hair. Not only that, but Dallon was holding Brendon in a tight grip, as if… _Brendon_ was comforting _Dallon._

 

(oh how the tables have turned…)

 

“Uh, Dallon, I love cuddling like any other guy, but I barely know you,” Brendon mumbled, and Dallon immediately released the smaller man. Brendon pretended he didn’t see the pink brushed against Dallon’s cheeks, “At least buy me dinner first, eh?”

 

Brendon’s sad attempt at a joke was rewarded with a shy smile, the blush deepening even further.

 

“Ah, sorry about that… it’s just, I know someone who has panic attacks a lot, and she - uh, _they_ liked when I hugged them,” Dallon explained (the smile was gone with the mention of _she_. there was something in his eyes, something like sadness. wistfulness. brendon didn’t push it, and neither did he push the mention of ‘liked’).

 

“Well, it worked. I, uh… thanks,” Brendon finished lamely, his mind suddenly emptied of words. He looked back at Dallon, who was still looking slightly melancholy, emotions clouding his really blue eyes ( _really_ blue eyes? is that the only descriptor you can think of? and why are you even describing his eyes anyway? what the fuck? this isn’t a fucking fanfiction).

 

Dallon nodded. There was an awkward silence, one which made Brendon’s skin crawl and his hands tremble. He felt worse as Dallon cleared his throat and started to get up; he panicked, reaching out quickly and catching Dallon’s wrist (just full of impulsive decisions today, aren’t we?), nervously swallowing down the lump in his throat.

 

The silence continued, but now Brendon was hanging off Dallon’s wrist with his mouth opening and closing like a fish, desperately grasping at _anything_ to say, to make this better.

 

“You have really pretty eyes,” he said finally, his words coming out slightly choked.

 

_What the fuck_ . Why did he say that. What the fuck. Where did that even come from? That would _totally_ make this situation better. Thank you, brain.

 

Said pretty eyes widened slightly, and the blush came back on Dallon’s cheeks. Brendon was pretty sure his face was red from embarrassment, and he released Dallon’s wrist, covering his eyes with his hands as to not see Dallon’s shocked expression.

 

“I… sorry.”

 

“... I have to go, uh, talk to Ryan,” Dallon responded, and the flustered expression had transferred to his voice. _Great._

 

Neither said anything more until the door closed solidly behind Dallon, and only then did Brendon remove the hands from his face. He groaned in agony, lying back onto the pillow. Fantastic, not even the first day and he had already made things awkward between him and one of the people here.

 

This had to be a record of some kind of record (quickest instance of awkwardness? fastest known moment of petrifying embarrassment? ruining things in a matter of seconds?).

 

Brendon really, _really_ hoped that Dallon wasn’t the one in charge of this whole group. That would make things about, say, 10,000 times worse.

 

-

 

As soon as Dallon got the hell out of that room, he speed-walked to his “quarters” (why the hell were they called quarters? dallon was fairly sure they weren’t soldiers or sailors) and locked the door behind him, ignoring both Patrick and Ryan’s inquiries. He had passed the media room again on his escape to his room, and he avoided the stares of everyone in there, although he was almost _absolutely_ sure that he had seen Billie smirking, exchanging looks with Tré and Mike.

 

Dallon slumped against the wall, raising his hands to his cheeks to feel the heat that radiated off them. He couldn’t even remember the last time he had blushed like this.

 

(yes you do it was breezy breezy bree-)

 

Dallon slapped a hand to his forehead to stop that thought immediately, wincing at the sting. Great, he had a blush from someone complimenting his _eyes_ , and now a red spot on his forehead from hitting himself. Really good leader material, right here.

 

He searched his room for the familiar photo, finally locating it from where it was placed on his dresser. He pushed himself off the wall, walking over to the frame and lifting it so he could see it better.

 

It was of him and a beautiful woman, both smiling and looking happy. She was just tall enough to fit her head under his chin, eyes closed and smiling as if in bliss. His eyes were alight with happiness, smiling one of his signature crooked grins.

 

Dallon put the photo back. Now instead of the fluttering feeling in his chest and his cheeks feeling overheated, there was a sickness in his stomach and there was a lump in his throat. He stumbled back slightly, legs hitting his bed - he sat down heavily, covering his face.

 

As soon as he took in a shuddering breath, he let himself cry, tears sliding down his cheeks and shoulders shaking with sobs. He lowered his hands slightly to only cover his mouth, stifling the sobs as to not alert anyone walking by.

 

He couldn’t let this happen again. He couldn’t, he wouldn’t, he _shouldn’t_ . And yet here he was, flustered and blushing like a goddamn schoolgirl because the new arrival happened to compliment his eyes (it didn’t help that brendon wasn’t too bad on the eyes, either. sometimes dallon really despised the fact that he was bisexual, and that everyone was so goddamn _pretty_ ).

 

He had slipped up with Brendon, after helping him out of the panic attack, mentioning Breezy. Then Brendon had commented on his eyes, one of Breezy’s favorite features on Dallon, and now… He was getting a crush. He was 30, for chrissake, and the one responsible for the other 18 (now 19) Naturals in this place. He was even an Empath; he should _know_ how to stop himself from catching feelings. But it seemed he could help everyone but himself.

 

Dallon stilled at a knock on the door, the hand over his mouth tightening as if it could stifle his shuddering breath.

 

“Dallon?” Patrick’s concerned voice floated from behind the door, and Dallon couldn’t stop the choked sob from slipping out of his throat, too loud to be stifled by his hand.

 

“Dallon, you’ve locked the door. That either means you’re having some… uh, _alone time_ , or you’re crying. Please just let me in if you’re crying.”

 

Dallon knew it was useless to push Patrick away - he had tried doing that after Breezy… anyway, he had tried to push everyone away, but failed immensely as Patrick had gotten Pete (who was much more well-versed in the whole picking locks thing) to disable the lock on his previous door, and they found that he had just been lying in his bed for the past week and a half, not bothering to get up other than for the bathroom and to get water. He had only eaten a few sandwiches and a Dr. Pepper in that amount of time as well, so he was far too weak to get up, even if he really wanted to.

 

Dallon hesitantly got up, tears still leaking from his eyes but his sobs successfully bottled up. He unlocked the door, opening it to Patrick looking up at him with an overly concerned expression, and his hands a can of Dr. Pepper.

 

“So you’re crying, then.” Patrick answered his own previous question, and Dallon smiled slightly (he was fairly sure it looked more like he was in immense pain, but he tried. he really did), “Do you want to talk about it, or should I just leave you with this and let you figure it out by yourself?”

 

Right then, Patrick reminded him so much of Breezy, and how she used to help him out of his slumps with a willing attitude to listen and his own decision of whether or not he wanted help, that Dallon crumpled again.

 

He wrapped his arms around Patrick’s petite frame, burying his face into Patrick’s neck so that no one could see his tears (he was certain that no one else was around, but he had to be cautious). Patrick immediately hugged him back, walking them into Dallon’s room and closing the door firmly behind them with his foot.

 

Dallon was still shaking with the force of his sobs, and he was soaking Patrick’s neck thoroughly with his tears, but the shorter man didn’t seem to mind.

 

“You wanna talk?” Patrick repeated the question, and Dallon shook his head.

 

Patrick nodded, and started to rock Dallon back and forth, humming something. Dallon found it _slightly_ ridiculous that he was being rocked like a small child that had just had a nightmare by a man almost a full foot shorter than him, but he had seen much weirder things. _Much_.

 

Minutes passed; Dallon was sure that the rest of the group were speculating about Brendon, Dallon and Patrick, probably exchanging “confidential” theories about _Daltrick_ ( _pallon?_ ) and even _Brallon_ or _Daldon_.

 

Dallon didn’t pay attention to the “ships” that the others crafted, and he often laughed along with them when Dallon and Breezy was the most popular (was it dalzy? breellon? he couldn’t fully remember). But now whenever someone tried to pull anything like Daltrick, or Ryllon, or even Joshllon, Dallon fixed them with one of his blank stares and they stopped.

 

_This_ , however, was a problem. This whole Brendon thing. He was sure that Ryan was having a field day trying to tamp down the wildfire spreading of Brendon and Dallon (he was almost absolutely sure tyler, gerard and pete were the ones who would start it up. he wouldn’t put it past billie or tré, though).

 

Dallon pulled his head back from Patrick’s neck, wiping at his eyes and watching Patrick stare at him in concern.

 

“Breezy,” was the only thing he had to say before Patrick realized what had happened, and Dallon was pummeled by a wave of pity and understanding.

 

“It's something to do with Brendon, I assume. I'm not going to ask,” Patrick interrupted before Dallon could protest, “But I know for sure that it's something with Brendon.”

 

“I… I-i don't want to get into it. Has anything started up because of it?” Dallon stuttered.

 

“Well, Brendon tried to follow you after you left, but Ray caught him in the halls as he was going back to his own room and sent Brendon back. And, of course, Billie and Gerard have started the rise of Brallon.”

 

Dallon groaned, covering his face with his hands and scrubbing at his eyes. He _knew_ this would happen.

 

“They just want to see you happy again, Dallon, they aren't trying to be mean -” Patrick tried to reason, but Dallon cut him off.

 

“I am! I am. Happy,” Dallon shouted at first, but when Patrick jumped, he immediately felt guilty and repeated it in a softer voice.

 

Patrick didn't look convinced, but he left it alone, instead stepping away from Dallon and crossing his arms across his chest.

 

“If you _really_ want to convince everyone of that, then how about you come back to the media room and hang out for a bit? Let loose, I know we have responsibilities, but sometimes it just helps to relax,” Patrick prompted, and Dallon bit his lip as he thought.

 

“I… yeah, okay. If you don't mention the tears then I won't mention them.”

 

Patrick grinned and Dallon tried to reciprocate, but even if it felt empty to him it seemed to convince Patrick.

 

The smaller man ushered Dallon out the door and down the hall, but Dallon felt more like he was knowingly walking to his death than to his friends.

 

-

 

Brendon was _not going back into that fucking room, thank you very much_.

 

He tried following Dallon, just to try to get a layout of the place (he still didn’t fully know _why_ he had to stay here, but if he was, then he had to at least get a grasp of where he was going, and _no it was not to see dallon more that's ridiculous_ ), but only after a minute or two he was discovered.

 

The dude, Ray or whatever, was holding a very thick and threatening-looking textbook and a sharp-looking pencil. When he told Brendon to go back, Brendon didn’t even protest (much), but as soon as Ray disappeared Brendon went right back to sniffing out Dallon.

 

It was useless, sitting in that empty hospital ward; Brendon had been getting restless, and his stomach felt fine. He had even removed the bandages to see if the cut was healed; there was a nasty scar where the stab wound had been, and the edges of it were still scabbing, but Brendon shrugged and said _fuck it_.

 

He had never been good at following directions.

 

That was the short version, anyway, of how Brendon ended up in the “media room” with the rest of the nineteen Naturals in this place.

 

Most of them were punk, threatening, looking like they could punch Brendon’s face in if he breathed wrong. There were a few exceptions, though - there was Josh, who even though he had a full sleeve of tattoos and a mean resting face, had sunshine yellow hair and the best smile Brendon had ever seen. He _faintly_ remembered Dallon telling him that Josh said he wasn’t “fully healed yet”, so Brendon surmised he was the healer of whatever. His guess was correct.

 

There was also Tyler, Josh’s friend. He was taller than Josh by a few inches, thin and willowy, with brown hair and eyes and a puppy-dog smile. He had introduced himself in a very soft, high-pitched voice, which Brendon hadn’t expected but immediately accepted. It somehow fit him. Josh told Brendon that Tyler was an _umbrakinetic_ , and when Brendon’s eyes widened Tyler had laughed and explained that he could control darkness.

 

Brendon couldn’t imagine such a… _dark_ (haha, dark, get it..?) power for such a nice person, but he soon shrugged it off and continued with meeting everyone.

 

There was Gerard and Mikey, who Josh said were two brothers. Gerard was a hydrokinetic while Mikey was a cryokinetic. Also, Mikey was lying dead-weight on his older brother, which Brendon didn’t question. There was Joe, who was a telekinetic (brendon had laughed, and when joe asked what was so funny, brendon explained that he was a tele _path_ while joe was a tele _kinetic_ . he didn’t laugh back), there was Andy, who had supernatural strength, and Pete, who _claimed_ he could control time, and swore up and down that he had once gone back to the 1800’s by accident. Sure, buddy.

 

Brendon waved hello to Jon and Spencer (he already knew the shapeshifter and pyrokinetic, and they looked happy to see him), while Ryan stared down at his cards, avoiding Brendon’s gaze. Brendon resisted the urge to get inside Ryan’s mind, see what he was thinking; that would _for sure_ make him like Brendon again. However, he didn’t recognize the other two people with them. Soon enough, though, he learned that the one slapping cards down aggressively was Kenny (who could create portals, that was fucking cool), and the one who was desperately trying to keep up was Dan, an aerokinetic.

 

Brendon was soon getting overwhelmed by the amount of information being thrown at him, and so he asked Tyler and Josh to pause while he mentally made a list of everyone.

 

(dallon - i don’t know. josh - healing. tyler - darkness. gerard - water. mikey - ice. joe - telekinesis. andy - strength. pete - time, maybe. jon - shapeshifting. spencer - fire. ryan - earth. kenny - portals. dan - air.)

 

He put it in the front of his mind, focusing back on Tyler and Josh only to see them looking at him weirdly.

 

“What?” he asked innocently, tilting his head slightly to the left. It was his _i’m a cute little puppy dog please don't hurt me_ look, and he really hoped it worked.

 

“Dude, you stopped in the middle of you asking for _something_ and stared into space for like, a solid minute,” Josh explained, and Brendon stilled.

 

“Oh.” he scratched the back of his neck, “I do that sometimes. I was making a list of everyone, there's a shit-ton of people here.”

 

“That's true,” Tyler laughed, and then continued to introduce everyone. Brendon liked that; he didn't dwell on Brendon’s weird little ticks.

 

There were Billie, Tré and Mike over in the corner, who Josh called the “three blind mice and wise men simultaneously”. Billie was immortal, Mike had a weird regenerative healing factor, and Tré was invincible.

 

“Dude, no way you're invincible,” Brendon immediately protested. Tré, in response, punched himself in the face, making Billie sigh and Brendon jump. His face was unharmed, his hand perfectly fine.

 

Okay then.

 

“...Point taken,” Brendon replied, mentally adding the three to his list.

 

There was only Frank left, who Tyler explained was a haemokinetic, or person who could control blood.

 

“That's fuckin metal as shit, man. I can only get into people’s heads, and trust me, that's not all fun and games like it seems,” Brendon said in awe, and Frank laughed.

 

“Now, Dallon hasn't taken the liberty to tell me what his power is,” Brendon prompted, and Frank rolled his eyes.

 

“Of course he hasn’t. He's one of the most closed off people, I swear,” Frank sighed.

 

“He's an empath. He can sense everyone’s emotions, and sometimes he can control them. It's really inconvenient when you're trying to be all secretive, though, he immediately knows if you're lying,” Josh explained, and Brendon’s eyebrows shot up.

 

“Interesting. He seemed to know I was having a panic -” Brendon cut himself off.

 

_(too much too much you're oversharing)_

 

“Panic?” Tyler asked.

 

“Panic! At The Disco!” Spencer yelled from the back of the room.

 

“Spencer, we don't want to hear about your shitty high school band again,” Joe yelled back, and Brendon relaxed fractionally as everyone laughed.

 

“Hey, don't leave out Patrick. He's got charmspeak,” Pete said to Brendon, and Brendon assigned this mysterious “Patrick” the role in his mind.

 

“He's also precognizant, and I don't know why the gods picked him to have two powers but whatever,” Andy added, and Brendon choked. He did _not_ expect such a fluttery, high-pitched voice from a dude that had tattoos all the way up to his neck.

 

“I knew someone like that, her name was Ashley or Halsey or whatever she goes by nowadays. She could, like, control sound, but also control light. She was super powerful,” Josh added.

 

“Dude, that's so unfair. People can have multiple powers and shit, and I can only know what people are thinking about when they're jacking it,” Brendon complained, and Pete roared with laughter as Tyler choked with surprise.

 

Pete quieted down, however, when the door opened behind Brendon. He turned, seeing Dallon and a super short dude walk in. That must be Patrick, then.

 

Brendon narrowed his eyes when he saw Dallon’ splotchy face, red-rimmed eyes, the way his breath shuddered. Had he been crying..? There was also a blanket draped across his shoulders that hadn't been there before, but no one else was looking to mention it, so he let it be.

 

“Why doesn't he have a shirt on?” Patrick questioned, and Brendon quickly looked down at himself. Oh, yeah. That was a thing (also, he had really deep voice for such a small dude. but then again, andy sounded like a baby deer prancing through a meadow on a warm spring’s day, so he should really stop expecting these people to sound like they looked).

 

“There was no shirt when I woke up, so no shirt now,” Brendon responded. He barely remembered when he walked in, Josh had taken a double take when he saw him, and Ryan had been blushing slightly… and of course, Brendon hadn't thought anything of it.

 

Before Patrick could reply, though, Dallon threw the blanket at Brendon, the weight of the fabric landing on his head and causing him to stumble back. There was a high-pitched giggle behind him - Brendon assumed it was Gerard, still under his brother's weight.

 

“Thanks, honey,” Brendon said after he tugged the blanket off of his head, winking at Dallon as he tied the blanket around his neck like a cape. Dallon blushed; Tyler gasped.

 

Brendon should really learn how to control his impulses.

 

“I _told_ you!” Tyler squeaked, shoving Josh sideways in excitement. Patrick, despite his height and (honestly) ridiculous fedora, looked like he was about to deck Brendon, and much to Brendon’s chagrin Pete noticed Patrick’s expression as well.

 

“Kick his ass, Trick!” Pete shouted, and Brendon started to panic, taking about five steps back. Luckily, Dallon came to his rescue.

 

“How about we leave the ass-kicking for later, and choose a movie?” he cut in, putting a hand in front of the tiny man just as Patrick started forward.

 

Clearly, this was a huge thing, as Mikey was finally pushed off his older brother by said excited man, Joe and Andy simultaneously shouted in triumph, and Billie and Tré started to drag the chairs and bean bags together. Josh and Tyler high-fived, Pete and Frank cheered, and Ray came in with a vaguely confused expression that deepened when he saw the state of his friends.

 

Jon, who was the closest to a dismal little stack of beat-up DVDs, cringed back and dropped his cards for Uno as most of the others rushed him; Dallon clapped his hands, and immediately a wave of calm seemed to emanate from his hands, throughout the room.

 

“Now,” Dallon said, taking charge, “We don't want a result like last time. Please just choose two options and we’ll take a vote on which we’ll watch. Frank, if you use your powers on anyone, you're banned from watching.”

 

Frank, who had been suspiciously leaning against the wall and watching the others, had the credit to look slightly guilty and stood up, walking over to where Mike had joined Billie and Tré in creating a lush-looking pile of bean bags, chairs, pillows and a beaten up couch.

 

Brendon stepped back from the crowd slightly, feeling overwhelmed; his anxiety always got worse in crowds, no matter if it was a group hug or mob coming to prosecute him (and surprisingly, both had happened to him at least once in his life).

 

Dallon silently slid next to Brendon as Patrick joined the fray - the only way Brendon even knew that Dallon had come up to him was that Pete had winked at _someone_ beside Brendon, and when Brendon looked where Pete had directed the wink, the taller man was there with a deeper blush on his cheeks.

 

Brendon didn't know if he could say something or not (why were you crying? did i step over a boundary? should i not compliment you? why are you so prett-). Brendon cut his own thoughts off. He was going into dangerous territory, there.

 

A hand popped up above everyone’s heads, a movie clutched tightly in it. Brendon was barely able to read it, squinting at the text.

 

“Little Shop of Horrors!” Gerard yelled, just as another movie popped up.

 

“Hell, no! Star Wars: A New Hope!” Pete shouted back. Brendon immediately felt his heart tear in half - he loved both movies immensely. How could he ever choose?

 

“If you’d all stop stepping on Jon and Kenny, and sit where Billie, Tré, Mike and Frank so _graciously_ pulled all of our chairs and bean bags together, we’ll hold a vote,” Dallon called before Gerard and Pete could get in a fight.

 

The swarm went over to the mess of chairs, pillows, bean bags and couches, settling down. Mikey was back to lying entirely on Gerard, and Frank sat next to them with Ray, both looking like this was normal. Tyler and Josh both sat in one armchair, Josh partially sitting on Tyler and leaning back onto his friend. Mike laid over the couch, Billie sitting on his feet and Tré sitting on the ground in front of the couch. Joe and Andy joined Tré, Jon and Spencer sat on two bean bags while Ryan wedged his thin frame between the two vinyl bags, and Kenny and Dan took the other armchair, Dan leaning on Kenny’s legs.

 

Before Brendon could offer Dallon the remaining bean bag, the taller man was already walking over and sitting on the pool table, slightly away from everyone else. Brendon assumed it was to count the vote, and took the beat-up, navy blue bean bag for his own.

 

“Okay, all of you cover your eyes,” Dallon started.

 

“We're not kindergarteners, Dallon!” Billie snapped.

 

“Yes, that's true, but I also know you’ll rip each other apart if one of your friends votes for the opposite movie you want,” Dallon said back, his tone flat and closed off from discussion.

 

Billie shut up.

 

“Now, again, close your eyes.” This time, everyone obeyed. Brendon did as well, not looking to incur Dallon’s wrath.

 

“Hands up of Little Shop of Horrors.” There was a moment of silence as Dallon counted, then he continued, “Hands up for Star Wars.”

 

Brendon felt as if he was going against the natural order and committing blasphemy against the gods of movie musicals as he raised his hand for Star Wars (please don't hate me i just want to enjoy some quality john williams music and whiny luke skywalker), almost immediately putting his hand down again after a second.

 

“Open your eyes again,” Dallon said after another moment, and cautiously everyone obeyed again, looking at each other suspiciously, as if testing if anyone had betrayed the group.

 

Dallon didn't announce the winner of the vote immediately, instead opting to let everyone stew in their own anticipation and distrust. Agonizing moment by agonizing moment passed, and finally Dallon spoke up.

 

“The winner is, with a landslide vote…” Dallon trailed off, letting the silence drag on. Brendon could see that he was fighting off a smile, and after a second Pete broke.

 

“Dallon I swear to _God-”_ Pete threatened, and Dallon smiled.

 

“Fine, fine, the winner was Star Wars,” Dallon gave in, and Gerard let out a loud grieving noise from under Mikey. Billie and Tyler voiced their disappointment as well, but Dallon ignored them as he got up from his spot on the pool table and slid the DVD into the player, positioning the TV to face everyone in the mess of chairs and bean bags. Mikey patted Gerard’s head in comfort.

 

Chatter started up again as Dallon fiddled with the DVD player, turning on the screen and skipping all the previews. After a moment, the taller man got up and went back to sitting on the pool table, turning off the lights as he passed the switches.

 

The noise died down frighteningly quick as the iconic sentence appeared on the screen, Brendon wrapping Dallon’s blanket tighter around himself as he mouthed the words.

 

_A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…_

 

**_END OF PART ONE._ **

 

|| -.-. --- ..- .-.. -.. / - .... .. ... / -... . / .-.. --- ...- . / .- - / ..-. .. .-. ... - / ... .. --. .... - --..-- / --- .-. / ... .... --- ..- .-.. -.. / .. / .-- .- .-.. -.- / -... -.-- / .- --. .- .. -. ..--..||


	2. part two (a disaster, indeed)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shit goes downhill real fast, and Dallon wasn't prepared for it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm actually dying guys this is 21k words... almost 22k... almost DOUBLE the length of the previous part... who even am i
> 
> plus i finished it super quick and i feel a very strange sense of guilt, like i'm just kind of shoving the words on a page and hoping for the best... i think that's why i'm actually putting effort to edit this part lol, to get rid of this stupid, very inconvenient but very suffocating feeling that i have no idea why it's there. also!!! i just got out of a super long show in my school's theatre program, so i'm super tired and i didn't finish the editing... lol i'm prepared for this to be full of mistakes
> 
> but anyway, who wants to listen to my feelings when you have a super long chapter to read??? there are a bunch more characters introduced around the middle, and not all of their powers/abilities are mentioned, so i'll make a quick list so you know what to expect:
> 
> Breezy - telekinesis   
> Sarah - Illusion/mirage creation  
> Jenna - haemokinesis   
> Elisa - clairvoyance  
> Marie - pyrokinesis   
> Megan - shapeshifting  
> Lyn-z - iron skin  
> Aridenne - space manipulation  
> Linda - formshifting  
> Marina - atmospheric/pressure manipulation  
> Melanie - poison manipulation  
> Lana - empathy  
> Hayley - super speed  
> Lyndsey - Precognition   
> Ashley - light and sound manipulation
> 
> this is already getting long enough so get ready for my rambling in the notes at the ennnnnnnnnd! and enjoy

“Look… I know you don’t want to think about it, but I just heard the announcement on the radio. They’re going to find us soon.” 

 

Brendon stilled as he heard Patrick’s hushed voice inside the kitchen, urgent and slightly panicked. 

 

He knew it wasn't good to eavesdrop on his and Dallon’s conversations, but Brendon knew they wouldn’t tell him otherwise, so here he was.

 

The two had started to get more and more secretive over the last few weeks, stopped telling the group updates about the situation in the government and new Natural containment laws, stopped participating in group activities like movie nights and game nights, stopped telling Ryan even. Brendon had been there when Ryan had started crying, talking about how Dallon and Patrick were cutting him off, refusing to tell him things and how he was paranoid about them getting rid of him. 

 

Brendon had forced the two to apologize to Ryan then. He couldn't stand when any one of his friends cried, especially not Ryan (as much as he’d like to hide it, brendon didn’t need to be an empath like dallon to know that ryan still had feelings for brendon. truth be told, brendon only thought of him as a close friend now. relationships were hard) and knowing it was the two leaders’ fault infuriated him. They promised to Ryan to include him in things again, but Brendon knew was an empty promise. 

 

Mostly because Ryan wasn't in the kitchen with them just then, he was in the media room, teaching Gerard make-up tips.

 

“What do you mean?” Dallon whispered back, and Brendon settled himself against the wall, far enough so they couldn't see him, but near enough so he could hear clearly. 

 

“The whole new ‘Natural Extermination’ law was passed yesterday. They made a whole fancy organization for it and everything. It's no longer the Supernatural Identification and Detection Agency, it's the Supernatural Identification, Containment, and Extermination Agency,” Patrick said back, and Brendon felt a chill run up his spine as Dallon cursed under his breath. 

 

“Jesus Christ,” Dallon mumbled. 

 

“We have to let them know soon, Dallon. Public opinion is very quickly turning against us, and two days ago a Natural was beaten halfway to death, in the grocery store we usually go to for supplies, by ‘frightened’ bystanders while she was checking out her groceries,” Patrick continued, and Brendon could hear Dallon sigh. 

 

“I know, it's just… they're going to want to fight, to follow in the footsteps of that one group, the one in Colorado. I don't blame them, but the one who can control his powers the best is Brendon, and even then he has slip ups where he goes into everyone’s mind and scares us half to death,” Dallon murmured. Brendon felt a twinge of annoyance, but fought to keep it down, knowing that Dallon was keeping his powers fine-tuned for any reaction that wasn’t Patrick’s or his own. 

 

“We can learn, Dallon. Billie knows more than everyone here, he was there in 1963 when the Naturals were fighting for their rights along with everyone else. He can teach us to control our powers, teach us to fight both peacefully and violently.” 

 

Brendon shivered at Patrick’s words, at the cold steel in his voice that appeared whenever he was deathly serious. He knew that violence was a language that every human knew from birth (he subconsciously reached down and placed his fingers on the long-healed scar on his side, remembering the hate in the eyes of the guy who had stabbed him), but this was a reality Brendon was fairly sure no one was prepared for.

 

“... I would ask if he would even be willing to teach us, but we both already know the answer. Billie’s always been vocal about his opinions, and I know he’s been following just as closely as we have,” Dallon said after a moment, and Brendon could hear the bittersweet amusement in his voice, the slight awe of the immortal. 

 

“Then we’ll ask him. Today. Maybe we can even tell everyone else today about it, when Billie says yes,” Patrick replied. He was putting a lot on the line for Billie’s hypothetical yes, even  _ assuming _ that Billie would say yes, “ We can’t waste time if they’re already looking for us. We can’t be sitting ducks, we have to do something.”

 

Brendon didn’t stick around for Dallon’s answer, recognizing that the conversation was coming to an end - it was already stupid enough to be eavesdropping, and Brendon didn’t have  _ that _ much of a death wish to be caught. 

 

Hurrying down the hall, Brendon thought again about Ryan. His annoyance flared up - Dallon and Patrick were nice, sure (brendon was already harboring a crush on dallon, but no one  _ really _ needed to know that), and they were trying their best, but so was Ryan. They needed to acknowledge his efforts, do more than just a pat on the head and a “good job”. Brendon and Ryan tiptoed around each other, knowing that eventually they’d have acknowledge the whole  _ ryan still likes me but i like dallon now _ situation, but Brendon was still furious that Dallon and Patrick were purposely excluding Ryan. 

 

He just didn’t want to see Ryan hurt again.

 

An idea formed in Brendon’s mind just as he passed by the media room, making him slow down and start to turn back to the door. 

 

Maybe he  _ did _ have that much of a death wish. 

 

Brendon walked into the media room, and just as he had been doing before when Brendon got up to leave previously, Ryan was showing Gerard various makeup tips on an unwilling-looking Jon. No one else was in the media room other than Pete and Andy (who were playing a very competitive game of ping pong), and then Tyler and Josh over by the TV playing Mario Kart.

 

“Hey, Ryan, can I talk to you for a moment?” Brendon called, and Ryan’s head shot up, blinking in confusion. 

 

“Sure,” he replied, handing the brush to Gerard, who enthusiastically began to work on Jon as Ryan followed Brendon out the door. He didn’t see Tyler and Josh give each other a knowing look, nodding slightly and mouthing,  _ Ryden _ .

 

Brendon led Ryan down the hall, opposite to his original path, and where Dallon and Patrick were surely going to walk. His hands were sweating, his anxiety steadily rising, and he bit his lip. As soon as they turned the corner, Brendon whipped around to face a bewildered-looking Ryan. 

 

“Look, Dallon and Ryan don’t know that I know this, so I have to be quick,” Brendon started in a hushed tone. Ryan’s face flickered with understanding, maybe, or it was anger, Brendon still wasn’t that good with reading people. 

 

“Did you listen in again -?” Ryan hissed, but Brendon cut him off. 

 

“No! Well, maybe, but this is important. Apparently, that horrible “Natural extermination” bill that’s been floating around for a while was finally passed yesterday,” Brendon plowed on, not letting Ryan cut in again. His face changed again, mouth opening and eyes widening in shock, “Already they’ve adjusted the SIDA to the Supernatural Identification, Containment, and Extermination Agency, and the normal public is starting to get violent. A Natural was beaten in that little grocers we always go to, by ‘frightened bystanders’.”

 

Brendon closely watched Ryan’s expression, giving the taller man a moment to process. 

 

“... And they didn’t plan on telling me any of this, right? That’s why you’re telling me now?” Ryan’s tone changed from shocked to annoyed, and Brendon could easily recognize the fire in Ryan’s eyes. 

 

“That would be correct, yes,” Brendon hesitantly replied, and Ryan shut his mouth, grinding his teeth. 

 

A moment of furious silence passed, Ryan staring at a spot above Brendon’s head like he wanted to set this place on fire, Brendon nervously straining his ears and powers to see if Patrick and Dallon were nearing them.

 

“Fine! That’s fine,” Ryan finally said, startling Brendon with the saccharine sweetness in his tone. 

 

Uh oh. 

 

“It’s not fine, I know that tone,” Brendon rebuked, and Ryan glared down at him. Brendon shrunk back, before remembering who he was and straightening up, “Look, I’m just as pissed as you are, but they’re planning to tell everyone else, finally, so there’s not much else I could do.”

 

Another silence passed, this time with Ryan and Brendon glaring daggers at each other. 

 

“Fine,” Ryan ground out again, whipping around and stomping back to the media room. Brendon nervously poked his head over the edge of the wall, only relaxing when he saw that Patrick and Dallon were absent. 

 

Brendon looked guiltily over his shoulder before moving again, walking quickly to his room. Every so often he would glance back again, even though he knew it was stupid and Patrick and Dallon were clearly  _ not _ following him.

 

But, then again, he  _ really _ didn’t need for Patrick and Dallon to find out. 

 

-

 

“No.”

 

Billie’s tone was flat, clearly not leaving his answer up for discussion. Patrick, standing stunned beside Dallon, tried anyway. 

 

“But - Billie, please - you fought for Natural rights in the 1960’s,” Patrick pleaded. It was clear that the older man was not very impressed. 

 

“That I did. But back then, we were already being beaten for our powers. This is much,  _ much  _ more than that,” Billie intoned, his voice still very flat and his eyes unwavering from their firm gaze. 

 

“Billie…” Patrick said helplessly. Dallon  _ knew _ that when Patrick had said ‘when Billie says yes’, it wasn’t going to work, but he had kept up the optimism. He really hated seeing Patrick defeated. 

 

“Did you know that the girl they had beaten in the grocery store died two hours ago?” Billie informed, and Dallon felt his heart drop, “Did you know, that back in the 1960’s, we only took about a step forward, and now we’ve taken five steps back? People are allowed to kill us now, Patrick, legally.”

 

“Come on,” Dallon murmured, having enough with the conversation. Billie was very clearly standing firmly on his answer as no, and when he decided something, well… it would take an army to make him change his mind. 

 

Patrick looked at Billie pleadingly as he let Dallon pull him back, and Dallon was tempted to leave Patrick behind when Billie spoke up again. 

 

“I can’t - I can’t stand it when you look like that,” the immortal man cut in quickly, and Dallon turned, incredulous. 

 

Billie was looking very guilty, the steel in his expression and tone gone and replaced with sheepish shame. 

 

“Are you sure..?” Dallon asked slowly, ignoring Patrick’s overjoyed exclamation and brilliant smile. The only other time Billie had ever changed his mind from a decision was when he had accidentally voted for Monopoly instead of Twister; back then, he wasn’t so guilty looking, instead violently screaming, “NO!” and slapping Monopoly out of a cringing Ryan’s hands. The contrast between the two situations was dramatic, for sure. 

 

“I - well,  _ fuck, _ uh - it’s not going to be all fun and games like it has been so far,” Billie stammered, before the fire creeped back into his voice and he straightened up. Patrick nodded; it was kind of sad how much he idolized Billie, “It helps that most of us know how to control our powers  _ somewhat _ . I’d say out of all of you, Dallon’s probably the closest to being proficient in being able to use his powers.” 

 

Dallon felt Patrick’s gaze swivel to the taller man, and he immediately felt hot under the scrutiny. He had said Brendon was the best at controlling his telepathy, but Billie clearly thought otherwise. 

 

“But…” Billie sighed, ran a hand through his wild hair, “... Sure. I’ll do it.”

 

Patrick let out a triumphant whoop, and Billie’s expression changed from stern to adoring, like a father looking at his little son. Dallon felt as if he was intruding, but Billie looked from Patrick to Dallon, his expression softening again. 

 

“I’d suggest you tell everyone else, first. They’re not going to take it well that you’ve been hiding all this from them, and it may take a bit for everyone to forgive you,” Billie started again, looking away from Dallon. 

 

Dallon immediately knew who he was talking about - even though Frank and Joe disagreed about many a thing, they were joined together by one thing. 

 

Being able to hold a grudge forever. 

 

“I’ll talk to Joe separately, and I’m sure that Gee will eventually turn Frank over. Plus, they both love using their powers, so I’m certain they’ll join in the activities even if they’re mad at us,” Patrick responded, and Dallon laughed. They had both thought of the same people. 

 

“That’s the thing. It’s not going to be activities. It's going to be everyone using the exercise room, not just Andy, and converting some of these empty rooms to practice rooms. We live in a goddamn empty storage building, for god sakes, we could easily put this empty space to use,” Billie cut in. Both Dallon and Patrick frowned. 

 

“I use the exercise room,” Dallon protested, just as Patrick said, “Well, I go into the exercise room every Sunday, so it isn’t just Andy.”

 

Billie rolled his eyes. 

 

“Sure. Whatever. Go tell everyone, we need Joe and Frank to have their tantrums sooner than later.”

 

Dallon made a face at the thought of Frank throwing a tantrum. While Joe could, technically, throw things around with his mind, he preferred to do the “hands on” version (in his own words). Frank, though, used his powers to the best of his ability. The image of what happened last time filled Dallon’s mind and he shuddered. He  _ really _ didn't want anyone to be randomly thrown around by the blood in their own body again. 

 

Patrick seemed to be thinking of the same instance, wincing at the memory as he walked out of the room. 

 

“Let's hope that Frank doesn't make someone’s head explode this time, and hopefully not one of ours.”

 

-

 

Brendon sat on one of the two couches in the media room, squeezed in between a restless Pete and an abnormally quiet Ryan. Ryan had always been soft-spoken, not speaking unless it was important, but this was a different kind of quiet. An angry quiet. 

 

Brendon moved slightly more toward Pete. He didn't want to make Ryan even more annoyed by touching the silent man.

 

Patrick, Dallon and Billie had called the rest of the group into the media room about  _ something _ (something aka finally telling the truth to everyone). Gerard had stopped in the middle of giving Jon a makeover, leaving the man with unblended contour, fake eyelashes only glued to his left eye and lined lips that weren’t filled in yet. Jon was sitting next to Tyler, who gaped at Jon’s face, and Andy, who looked like this was a typical Tuesday afternoon, on the other couch. Gerard was perched on the armchair opposite to Jon’s couch with Frank, nervously watching if the makeup became messed up in any way. 

 

Mikey was sat in one of the other armchairs, one of the new ones, stubbornly laying across it so no one would share. Despite this, Josh had found a way to sit on the back of the chair without tipping it backward, feet tucked under a grumbling Mikey’s back. The remaining armchair was groaning under the weight of Spencer, Joe and Tré all together, Joe successfully winning the seat and Spencer sitting on the left arm, Tré on the right. 

 

The remaining four people (ray, mike, kenny and dan) were scattered across the floor, lying on the beanbags or sitting on the pillows discarded from the two couches. A low-volume chatter filled the atmosphere, people still determined to talk but unsure about  _ what _ . 

 

“Dude, do you have any idea of why they told us to get in here? They’re not even here themselves?” Pete was one such person, his voice cutting through Brendon’s thoughts. Before Brendon could even  _ think _ about replying, though, Ryan shot a death glare at him.  

 

He gulped, getting the message. 

 

“No idea. I haven’t seen them all day, even. I wonder what this is for,” Brendon lied, internally wincing at his choice words. If he was bad at reading people, lying came second in the list of ‘Things Brendon Cannot Not Do’. They always said that including a little bit of truth helped the lie be believable, though, and the second part wasn’t a lie. He hadn’t  _ seen _ Patrick and Dallon talking, just heard them. 

 

Technicalities always worked. 

 

“Yeah,” Pete responded, but quickly became distracted as his attention shifted to the entrance of the media room. Brendon, following his gaze, saw the doorknob twitch fractionally. 

 

Brendon’s heart rate increased by more than just a fraction. 

 

Another moment passed, and Brendon glanced at his right to see that Ryan was just as fixated on the door as Pete and Brendon, if not more. His heart jumped as the doorknob rattled again, this time loud enough to everyone else in the room to quieten and look to the door. 

 

It was quiet enough to hear a scuffle, a muffled argument behind the door, then Patrick walked into the room looking annoyed and ruffled. Dallon followed, signature blank expression on his face, and Billie soon after, scowling slightly and his arms crossed against his chest. 

 

Brendon wondered if Billie had agreed, then, to Patrick and Dallon’s proposal if he looked so sullen. Maybe Patrick and Dallon were telling everyone else anyway; maybe Billie had been forced to accompany them, break the bad news with a familiar and friendly face. 

 

“So… you’re probably all wondering why we’ve gathered you here today,” Patrick started awkwardly, clapping his hands together. Brendon rolled his eyes at the cliche opening - a groan rippled through the room, Patrick’s face growing red. 

 

“Yeah, a little bit,” Kenny responded sarcastically. 

 

“Well, uh…” Patrick trailed off, floundering. He clearly hadn’t planned this out very well. Luckily, Dallon came to the rescue. 

 

“We haven’t been completely honest with you.”

 

Brendon snorted before he could stop himself, immediately covering his mouth in surprise. Dallon’s gaze shifted from the general group directly to Brendon, as did everyone else’s. Brendon could feel Ryan’s eyes boring holes into the side of his face, and his face heated up from embarrassment. 

 

“Sorry, uh, something in my throat, it’s nothing, sorry,” Brendon stammered, trying to cough and replicate the sound he had made previously. 

 

It wasn’t working, but you have to give him credit. 

 

Another long moment passed before Dallon looked away and started to speak again. Brendon finally felt as if he could breathe easier.

 

“A lot of bad stuff has been happening in the government, concerning Naturals, in the past week. Last Wednesday a group of six Naturals in Louisiana were killed. Last Thursday, another group in Colorado fought back, killing three police officers and injuring two more. The government hasn’t tracked them down yet, but in the meantime a bill was passed yesterday,” A sharp intake of breath interrupted Dallon, but after his momentary surprise he let the heavy silence drag on. Even if the guy protested it, he had a huge flair for the dramatic.

 

“It’s legal in all 50 states to use deadly force against Naturals. Already, a Natural was beaten to death in the grocers down the highway from us. Numerous other cases have sprung up across the country,” Billie cut it, giving Dallon a dirty look as he talked. Clearly, Billie did not appreciate Dallon’s dramatic pauses. 

 

The silence after this statement was even heavier than the last one, lasting for much longer. Brendon glanced to his left to see that Pete looked completely and utterly shocked, his mouth slightly open and eyes wide. Most of the others seemed to be in a similar state, actually. The epitome of surprise.

 

Except for Ryan and himself, of course. 

 

“And you didn’t think of telling us sooner.” Ryan’s tone was bitter, sharp, cutting. Patrick and Dallon nervously shared a glance between each other; Billie’s scowl deepened. It was clear they had expected others to be unforgiving (brendon placed his money on joe and frank), but not Ryan. 

 

Never Ryan. 

 

“Ryan, we’re sorry, but -” Dallon tried to answer, but Ryan didn't let him finish. 

 

“There are no ‘buts’ to be had,  _ Dallon _ ,” Ryan snapped, spitting out Dallon’s name like it was poison, “There is no  _ sorry.  _ They're looking for us. They're going to kill us. You knew this, and you didn't even tell us. What do you want us to do, fight these trained officers and soldiers, these trained  _ killers _ , with powers that none of us here have learned to control?” 

 

As if to support Ryan, the ground began to rumble slightly, Ryan clenching his fists and glaring at Dallon.

 

“I understand your anger, Ryan, but  _ please. Please _ , just listen to us,” Dallon pleaded back, and Brendon felt his heart wrench at the expression on his face. The ground stopped shaking, but Ryan still looked furious. 

 

No one else in the room moved, in awe of the interaction in front of them. Ryan didn't lose his temper that easily, and he didn't use his powers. Period. (brendon had to find out about his geokinesis from spencer, who had shown him a rock that ryan had summoned when he was about five years old. that was it for the evidence of ryan’s abilities.)

 

“I'm listening.”

 

Ryan’s tone was flat, but he was watching Dallon closely, and Patrick sprang forward to take the opportunity. 

 

“We realize that none of us know how to use our abilities to the best of our extent. Some of us can't control the outbursts of power, some of us keep a cap on our powers constantly to prevent from damage, and some of us haven't ever used them so we don't know what to do with them. You're right, Ryan, we can't fight against these people when we have no resources. But we were given these abilities for a reason,” Patrick reasoned, making wide gestures. 

 

“We asked Billie if he would be willing to teach us -” Dallon continued, and Billie finished for him. 

 

“And I said yes. I may not have a ‘physical’ ability like a lot of you do, but I knew people with them. I know how to deal with them. I can help you guys, and I know that Mike and Tré can, too.” 

 

At the mention of Billie’s two friends, heads swiveled to see the two. Tré wiggled his fingers in greeting, Mike grinning mischievously from where he was reclining on a bright green bean bag. 

 

“I confirm,” Tré called, Mike nodding wisely. 

 

“We may not be as old as Billie over there, but we know a few tricks,” Mike added. 

 

“So… what do you say?” Patrick finished, directing the sentence at Ryan, but everyone knew the statement was for them as well. 

 

“... Stop making it seem like a feel-good high school movie, I'm not going to do anything if one of you fuckers break out into a heart-felt speech about the powers of love and friendship,” Ryan grumbled after a moment, and both Dallon and Patrick’s faces broke into two brilliant smiles. 

 

“We’re soarin, flyyyin’,” Tyler started to sing, and Ryan quickly threw the couch pillow behind him at the umbrakinetic. It hit Jon fully in the face, leaving a perfect imprint of the contour of his face and causing Gerard to squawk in protest and run over to assess the damage. The tension in the room dissipated immediately after that, laughter and chatter starting up again. Just like normal.

 

(brendon tried to ignore the way his heart skipped when dallon looked over at him, the taller man’s eyes lighting up in happiness. he tried, and failed as he grinned back.)

 

-

 

When Billie said “everybody using the exercise room”, Dallon didn’t really know what he meant by that. Would they be getting their muscles up, using physical fighting as well as using their powers? Would Billie teach them how to use the machines to their advantage, using their powers to get to the best results? Dallon had honestly no idea. 

 

“Joe, you’re the perfect one for this example. Come up here,” Billie called from his vantage point on two folded-up, hot pink tumbling mats. Tré and Mike were beside him, all three in work-out gear. 

 

In fact, everyone in here was in flashy, barely-used workout outfits (except for andy. he had some semblance of what he was doing). Dallon himself was in a loose-fitting white t-shirt and black basketball shorts, which was the only remnant of his crash-and-burn high school athletic streak. He was lucky that these even fit him still. 

 

Joe reluctantly stepped up to the hot pink tumbling mats, Billie, Mike and Tré towering over him like some kind of pagan god altar. 

 

(gods of exercise, maybe, or gods of training.)

 

Dallon’s eyes widened as Tré procured a twenty-pound weight from seemingly nowhere, dropping it in front of a startled Joe. Joe looked from the weight to Tré, face scrunched up in confusion. Dallon didn’t blame him. 

 

“Lift it - with your powers,” Mike explained, and Joe’s face cleared with understanding. 

 

Oh.  _ Oh. _ This is what Billie meant. 

 

Dallon didn’t know if he had ever seen Joe use his telekinesis; he used it to intimidate, sure, but actually  _ using _ it? Never.

 

Joe furrowed his eyebrows in concentration, focusing on the weight in front of him, his eyes narrowed and lips pursed. Dallon perked up as the weight seemed to come alive after a moment. It didn’t do much; it jumped a little, floated up two feet and hung for a split second, then crashed to the ground with a loud bang. 

 

“Good, good, now do it without thinking so hard about it that you look like you’re constipated,” Billie reprimanded, and Joe’s cheeks grew faintly pink as he glared up at the three. Billie grinned cheekily. 

 

Joe, looking back at the offending weight, stared at it for a solid minute. Nobody moved, nobody made a sound (dallon felt his chest aching, and he realized he wasn’t breathing). A couple more minutes passed, Joe staring at the weight with a completely blank expression. 

 

“Is he going to do anything -?” Someone whispered behind him after a good five minutes passed (dallon was fairly sure it was either brendon or pete, knowing that those two were insufferably impatient), but was cut off when the weight started to move again. 

 

This time, however, instead of just floating for a bit then dropping, it rose about five feet up and hung there for a second. Then, suddenly, it shot sideways, startling Patrick in front of Dallon and causing him to step backward onto Dallon’s foot. He winced, following the weight’s path with his eyes. It swerved around Billie and Mike, who cringed away from it, and stopped dead in front of the weight rack. It hovered there for a moment; Dallon could see sweat glistening on the edge of Joe’s forehead, but his face didn’t change from the blank, almost dead-looking expression. 

 

Almost gently, the weight started forward again, settling itself among the other weights without dropping suddenly or crashing. As soon as it was secured, something in Joe seemed to collapse - he leaned over, hands flying to his chest as he sucked in breath after breath desperately. Dallon panicked, starting to rush forward but stopped by an equally-panicked Patrick.

 

Billie jumped down from his perch in a hurry, concern written all over his face. Mike and Tré shuffled forward, looking to see what would happen. Billie softly placed a hand on the taller man’s shoulder, and Joe straightened slightly, still breathing heavily.

 

“I don’t think I breathed once during that,” Joe gasped, smiling and huffing with laughter despite his breathlessness. 

 

Dallon sighed in relief as he saw that that Joe was alright, and he turned slightly as clapping started up behind him. He rolled his eyes when he saw Josh and Brendon clapping enthusiastically, yelling and whooping in celebration. Pete and Tyler soon joined in, along with Frank, Jon, Kenny and Dan.

 

“Not bad, Joe!” Pete shouted, using his hands as a sort of megaphone. Joe snorted. 

 

“What Joe just  _ brilliantly  _ did was a step in the right direction,” Billie interrupted before anyone else could get too excited, “Obviously none of the rest of you have telekinesis, but the thought still applies. You don't want to focus so hard that you burst a vein, but you also have to be able to focus on breathing and shit like that.”

 

“So how can we do our equivalent of that?” Spencer asked, and Dallon could hear Ryan mumbling in agreement. 

 

“Ah, yes, that. You see, we can't  _ really _ use the equipment in here for all your powers. For instance, what the hell is Dallon going to do with this shit? Make the metal angry? What about Brendon? Is he gonna talk to the treadmill via mindpower? So I came up with a solution. All of the empty rooms in this place will renovated, made to accommodate everyone's powers. We don't have enough supplies to make a room for everyone, but we can have the bigger rooms for different groups, like elemental powers, mind-based powers, non-physical powers, et cetera,” Billie explained, Dallon looking up from where he was staring at his feet when Billie said his name. 

 

“So, like… Ryan, Dan, Gerard and Spencer would all be sharing a room because they're elementals, right?” Kenny piped up, and Mike nodded from behind Billie. 

 

“Yes, and you could include Mikey, Pete, Frank and Tyler on the technicality that they wouldn't fit anywhere else,” Tré responded. 

 

“Why don't we all figure out who our ‘groups’ are right now? It's something to do,” Dallon offered, and Billie paused, thinking. He scrambled back up on the tumbling mats, conferring with Mike and Tré. 

 

“I didn't know that took an entire meeting to agree on,” Patrick grumbled from in front of Dallon, and he cracked a smile. That was true. 

 

“Yes. Let's do that, then I'll show your group to the room you'll be using,” Billie finally said, but cut everyone off when they started to talk, “BUT! We don't have a lot of time. We're lucky enough to be in a very secluded place in the center of middle-of-fucking-nowhere woods, so we won't be found immediately. But we have to increase border patrols, we have to be more careful, and we can't dawdle with this training. Make the most of this opportunity.” 

 

The conversation after Billie's speech was more subdued than before, the reminder of reality heavy on everyone's shoulders. Billie, Mike and Tré jumped from the mats, joining everyone else on the floor. 

 

“So, I guess we’re together then? I'm precognizant and I have charmspeak, you have empathy, those are both mind based powers,” Patrick turned to Dallon, and Dallon nodded. That was reasonable (he searched the crowd for ray and brendon as well, joe quickly coming over to patrick and dallon). He spotted the poof of Ray’s hair over by Gerard and Mikey, and then the loud voice of Brendon was over by Ryan, who looked exasperated, and Jon. 

 

Brendon glanced over to where Dallon was, and when he took a double take Dallon motioned slightly with his head to indicate to come over; Brendon cocked his head in confusion before understanding and nodding. 

 

“The only other person I've ever seen you have silent conversations like that with was Breezy…” Patrick’s voice startled him, and Dallon looked away from Brendon walking over to stare at Patrick. The shorter man had a sad smile on his face, staring right back at Dallon with a sort of bittersweetness that made him look away. 

 

“I don't know what you're talking about.” Dallon’s voice seemed far away from his body, and before Patrick could protest Brendon was already at Dallon’s side, a brilliant smile on his face. 

 

“This is probably going to be a disaster, Frank and Ryan have already succeeded in pissing each other off and everyone else doesn't know what to do with them,” Brendon laughed, looking over to the group of elemental Naturals; sure enough, Frank was glaring at Ryan and Ryan was saying  _ something _ to the shorter man, snarling. 

 

Dallon looked away from the two quarreling Naturals, scoffing. Of course. Frank could probably start a fight with a brick wall if he really tried. 

 

“Hey, guys…” an awkward voice sounded from behind Dallon, and he looked around to see Josh looking lost. 

 

“Hey, man. Aren't you supposed to be in the physical powers and shit?” Brendon responded. 

 

“I thought so, too, but then I realized that Billie, Mike, Tré, Kenny, Jon, and Andy’s powers all have to do with themselves. Except for Kenny. Maybe I do belong over there,” Josh continued, frowning as he considered the options. 

 

“You can chill with us until they yell at you to go back over there, anyway,” Joe added, and Josh laughed, relaxing slightly. Ray finally came over after that, looking flustered and overwhelmed. 

 

“Frank has managed to start three arguments, all with someone else,” Ray informed them, and Patrick let out a loud laugh. 

 

“Oh my god, who?” Josh exclaimed, looking like this was both the best and worst news he had gotten lately.

 

“Ryan, Pete and Spencer. Gerard, Dan, Tyler and Mikey are trying to stop them from getting too worked up, but it's not working exceptionally well,” Ray continued, and Dallon shook his head in disappointment. 

 

“This is a disaster,” he mumbled as there was a swell of noise behind him, Frank yelling, what  _ sounded  _ like Pete and Spencer screaming, and Ryan shouting.

 

A disaster, indeed. 

 

-

 

“Dude, why are you thinking about Taco Bell’s chalupas when you’re trying to lift that bookshelf?” Brendon’s disbelieving voice cut through Dallon’s concentration, and Dallon blinked once, severing the connection to Josh’s mind. Josh had been a willing volunteer for Dallon’s work, reading a book on medical procedures and letting Dallon flip through his current emotions like the book in his hands. 

 

Dallon and Josh turned to see Joe looking scandalized, cheeks slightly red, and Brendon sitting a few feet away, arms crossed and head cocked at an angle, questioning. The bookshelf that Joe had been focusing on crashed to the ground, just high enough to make the floor rumble, but low enough so it didn’t collapse. 

 

“I… I thought you’re not supposed to read our minds!” Joe accused, searching for a reason for his thoughts. 

 

“C’mon, I wasn’t going into your mind.You’d be able to feel it, I don’t try to be discrete with you guys. I was doing a scan on the room, and your thoughts were  _ so loud _ that I could hear them without even trying. Are you, like, trying to tell me something?” Brendon scoffed, defending himself.

 

Ray looked up from his own book, smiling slightly before turning back. Patrick laughed from where he was on the other side of the room, and Joe shot a glare at his friend. Patrick laughed louder. 

 

“Well… I… I just, I haven’t been to Taco Bell in so long, and I saw an ad for their new chalupas on the TV yesterday - “ Joe admitted, and Brendon cut him off with a loud bark of laughter. Joe glared at him, blushing furiously. 

 

“Hey, dude, I don’t blame you. Their chalupas are godly,” Josh piped up, and Joe gestured wildly toward Josh. 

 

“See! See? I’m not the only one,” Joe snapped. 

 

“Yeah, well, you’re the one thinking about them when you’re also supposed to be thinking about lifting a bookshelf, soooo…” Brendon raised his eyebrows, reaching behind himself to grab his water bottle and take a long drink. 

 

“Hey, hey, we don’t want to argue like the guys in the elemental room. How are you guys with your progress, anyway? Billie wants all of us to gather and show off our work soon,” Patrick quickly changed the subject when Joe got dangerously red in the face, eyes narrowed and mouth opening to retaliate. 

 

“I’m pretty well along, but Josh has the amount of emotions of a brick wall when he’s reading. I need to get someone live, y’know, not sitting there knowing that I’m going to read their emotions and repressing everything,” Dallon replied, not giving Joe the opportunity to rip Brendon a new asshole. He saw Joe shut his mouth in his peripheral vision. 

 

“Hey!” Josh retorted. 

 

“It’s not you, dude, it’s that book. Maybe if you were reading something exciting, like an action novel, you would have more emotions,” Dallon defended himself, and Josh rolled his eyes, shutting the medical handbook. 

 

“Sure.”

 

“Okay, we can work on that. Joe, we all know that you’ve made a ton of progress. Didn’t you shift the refrigerator and oven yesterday?” Patrick continued. Joe blinked before nodding. 

 

“Uh, yeah, and I also moved a couple trees outside a few days ago, and Ryan reset them,” Joe confirmed, more upbeat now that they had moved from the subject of his thoughts. 

 

“That’s great!” Dallon praised, following Patrick’s example of questioning each person about their efforts, “Ray, how about you?”

 

“I’ve got everybody’s signatures memorized, so now I can track everyone down pretty easily,” Ray responded, focusing, “In fact, right now I can tell that Frank just threw a rock that Ryan summoned at Pete, and Dan redirected the air so it wouldn’t hit Pete. But I’m sure you knew something along those lines was happening, anyway.”

 

“Of course,” Patrick groaned, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. Dallon sighed. 

 

“Sometimes, their little fights are endearing, but they’ve gotta settle their playground rivalries before we actually get into combat of some kind… Brendon, how are you doing?” Dallon focused back on the conversation at hand, smiling tiredly at the telepath and voice unintentionally getting softer. Brendon grinned back, making Dallon’s heart jump. 

 

(not now, please)

 

“Great! I haven’t  _ actually _ gone into someone’s head yet, but if one of you lucky people would like to volunteer…,” Brendon’s voice got lower, searching the other five’s faces before straightening up and smiling again, “Nah, but I’ve been able to read surface thoughts, recall recent memories. I just need a person to let me rifle through, really dig deep.”

 

Dallon ignored the way his heart ached at the way Brendon’s voice deepened, instead nodding and smiling wider at the information. 

 

“Good, good, that’s great! Hopefully Billie will appreciate our progress, too,” Patrick said, removing the hand from his face and clapping his hands together. Just as his hands collided, a crash came from downstairs. Patrick sighed heavily as everyone jumped, staring down at their feet to hear the loud shouting and shuffling from the room underneath their weight. 

 

“Ryan, Tyler and Spencer are running up the stairs… wait, there’s someone I don’t recognize at the entrance, two people… who?” Ray’s eyes narrowed in thought, but before any more speculations could be heard, the door slammed open. Sure enough, Ryan, Tyler and Spencer were at the door, panting and looking injured. Ryan had a cut on his cheek; Tyler was holding his left wrist; Spencer was clutching at his stomach.

 

“What did Frank and Pete do now?” Dallon asked tiredly, stepping forward. 

 

“They got in a fight, per usual, we had to separate them,” Ryan grumbled, running a hand through his hair, “But that’s not the important part. Remember that group down in Colorado, the one that keeps fighting back against the new SICEA group?”

 

Dallon and Patrick looked at each other in surprise - this conversation was entering a place that they didn’t anticipate. 

 

“Yes,” Patrick replied, looking extremely confused. 

 

“Well, we have two, people here from that group. They’re saying that if they found us, SICEA isn’t too far behind, and we have to leave soon,” Tyler said nervously, hesitating before saying “people”. 

 

Joe and Brendon simultaneously cursed, Brendon scrambling up from his seated position and Joe moving forward a few steps. 

 

“Okay, but why were they looking for us in the first place?” Dallon asked, and Spencer shrugged. 

 

“They didn’t say. I don’t even know if they’re women or men, both have masks over their faces and their voices are distorted,” Spencer answered, and Dallon became even more confused. 

 

“Billie is talking with them right now, and they’re offering to ‘transfer’ us back to their base in Colorado… I don’t even know how they’ll manage to get all 19 of us there, they came on motorcycles and Colorado’s about two days away,” Ryan mumbled to himself, and before they could say anything more Dallon and Patrick pushed past the three, walking swiftly down the stairs. Dallon could hear Brendon, Josh, Joe and Ray talking with Ryan, Tyler and Spencer before following them.

 

“This is insane, we’re not even prepared, and can we trust these people? We have no way of knowing who they are other than what they give us,” Patrick ranted to Dallon under his breath, determined for the others behind him not to hear his misgivings. Dallon had to agree with the shorter man. 

 

“I’m sure that if Billie trusts them, we can trust them, but we can still be cautious. Ryan was right, too, how could they get us to Colorado in the amount of time they’re implying that SICEA will find us?” Dallon elaborated, and Patrick shook his head fractionally. 

 

“I don’t know,” he mumbled, just as they came to the bottom of the stairs. 

 

Dallon started forward, unconsciously lengthening his strides and walking faster; he slowed down when he heard Patrick huffing quietly, remembering that no one else in this place had long legs like him. He rounded the corner, Patrick and everyone else soon following.

 

He was greeted by the sight of two figures, dressed in black and thick, dark masks completely obscuring their faces. Billie and Mike were speaking with them in hushed voices, and Dallon felt a chill run up his spine when one of the dark figures replied. The voice was grating, low and mechanical, almost like a villian off Star Wars or Doctor Who. 

 

“That’s creepy,” Brendon said from behind Dallon, and Dallon nodded slowly. Brendon wasn’t wrong, they were exceptionally terrifying. Patrick turned and made a shooing motion - the people behind Dallon and Patrick groaned but obeyed, leaving to the media room. Glancing back before walking forward again, Dallon stopped just behind Billie and Mike.

 

“You say that you have a plane that can get us out of here?” Billie was asking, his tone incredulous. 

 

One of the figures, the shorter one, laughed dryly. The other one seemed to be staring at Dallon, but he couldn’t tell through the eyes of the mask; the eyes were blacked out with mesh.

 

“We do, and if you don’t believe us, we can easily bring it over here. But then that would reveal your location, and they’re already close enough to finding you,” the one who laughed replied, and Billie still looked skeptical, but he nodded. 

 

“That’s true,” Dallon said before Billie could reply, and the shorter man jumped, cursing loudly before he could stop himself. Mike reacted similarly, gasping and stepping back onto Dallon’s foot. Dallon winced. 

 

“Don’t. Do that!” Billie hissed, holding his chest. 

 

“What’re your names? I would feel better if I had some semblance of your identities,” Dallon asked the two figures, ignoring Billie and Mike completely. 

 

The two were silent for a bit, but Dallon had a feeling they were thinking. Billie and Mike didn’t push, either (they hadn’t asked their names why on earth why wouldn’t they ask that).

 

“Socialite,” the taller one answered finally, and Dallon’s heart jumped at the name (no it can’t be stop thinking that it’s impossible you  _ saw her die _ ), but he swallowed down his sudden nervousness. They were still looking in his direction unwaveringly. 

 

“And you?” he asked the shorter, and they quickly replied. 

 

“Kaleidoscope Eyes,” they said, and Billie scoffed. 

 

“That’s quite a name there,” he said sarcastically, “It sounds like one of the names Gerard would come up with for his comics.”

 

“We use our names to hide our identities, to protect ourselves from the ones hunting us.” The taller one, Socialite, didn't seem amused, and their tone made Billie shut up. They tore their gaze from Dallon to glare at the shorter man, but soon resumed their staring. He was starting to feel itchy and hot under their scrutiny. 

 

Patrick, who had been silently standing beside Dallon, spoke up. 

 

“You think you can get us out of here?” He asked, and Kaleidoscope Eyes swiftly nodded.

 

“We have a jet a few minutes away from here, far enough away from the forest to not be suspicious, but close enough to be easily accessible,” they elaborated, “We estimate that you have about three hours before they discover you location and attempt to enter the building. It takes thirty minutes to get to the plane, and then an hour and a half to our base in Colorado.”

 

The four of them were silent for a moment, before Mike spoke up. 

 

“Well? What are we waiting around for? We have to get out of here, call everyone down so we can tell them the situation,” he demanded, sounding firm. Patrick nodded in agreement and Billie stepped forward, toward the direction of the media room, Dallon and Mike soon following. Socialite and Kaleidoscope Eyes backed them, two silent and slightly threatening entities against his back.

 

Dallon still felt Socialite’s stare burning holes in the back of his head.

 

-

 

“This is the coolest shit I've ever seen,” Pete gasped, looking around the plane like a child in Disneyland.

 

Brendon knew nothing about planes, or jets, or anything that went into the air and flied. Nothing (zilch, nada, negatory). However, he had to agree with Pete. This  _ was _ really cool. From the outside, you wouldn’t expect the room inside the actual cabin. There were exactly nineteen seats (that was slightly creepy, as if they knew how many people were coming), all lining the walls like a normal plane, but y’know… not. Because this plane was slightly smaller. Like a private jet. 

 

There was a door leading to the whole piloting room, two seats reserved for Socialite and Kaleidoscope Eyes. Thinking back on the two, Brendon turned his head slightly to eye the figures in black. It was creepy, how he couldn’t get a read on  _ either  _ of them. Any time he tried to enter their minds (and believe him, contrary to when he tried with joe and patrick and all them, he attempted to be inconspicuous), there were thick walls that completely blocked out any thought from his prying eyes (er, mind eyes? thoughts? he didn’t know what to call them, honestly), even surface thoughts. It was weird. 

 

It was almost as if they were used to a telepathic Natural.

 

Also, it was weird how he kept referring to each of them as  _ they _ . The two were wearing virtually skintight suits, and Brendon was fairly sure that no man had hips like that. Or boobs. But, hey, he didn’t know everything, and he didn’t want to be insensitive. He kept quiet about it (as did everyone else) and continued on with his life.

 

Brendon walked over to where Spencer was sitting down, trying not to think again of the two people walking into the pilot’s cabin. He wasn’t one for conspiracy theories or suspicion, unlike Gerard or Joe. He was cut off from his path to Spencer, however, when Jon abruptly stole the only seat next to Spencer. Brendon frowned. 

 

“Sorry, man,” Jon said sheepishly, looking genuine but there was a tone to his voice that Brendon couldn’t translate, and that he didn’t like. 

 

Dallon could probably worm it out of Jon, that infuriating mystery emotion, but he was too damn nice. Thinking of the taller man, Brendon searched for his dark brown hair sticking out above the rest. Sure enough, Brendon locked eyes with him in the back row of seats. Nobody else was next to Dallon; Patrick was over chatting animatedly with Pete and the schematics of plane design, and Ryan was in the one-seater row, plugging in his headphones to drown out the noise of Kenny and Dan in front of him. Dallon looked away, resuming putting away his bags under the seat in front of him. 

 

Brendon quickly picked his way across to Dallon, careful not to step on anyone’s stuff - there was no overhead baggage thing thing on a regular plane, and their big pieces of luggage were securely tied down in the far back, near the door that lowered to let everyone out. As he neared Dallon, the taller man looked back up (again, brendon was stunned at his  _ fanfiction-blue eyes, you’re in too deep man _ ) and smiled shyly. 

 

“Jon and Spencer kick you out?” he said softly, letting Brendon past him to get the window seat. 

 

“Jon sat down just as I reached Spencer, I don’t know why,” Brendon grumbled, frowning before grinning at Dallon, “Or maybe I do. They’ve always been close.”

 

“I was wondering when you’d notice,” Dallon laughed quietly, reaching down to grab his backpack and retrieve his book and - wait… what?

 

Brendon cocked his head in confusion, furrowing his eyebrows; when Dallon noticed he hadn’t replied, he looked up from his backpack and smiled wider. 

 

“You  _ didn’t _ notice? Oh, boy,” he chuckled. 

 

“I meant in like, a best friends way,” Brendon said, eyes narrowing. Dallon should know by now that he had the emotional literacy of a tree trunk. 

 

“You have to be the most oblivious person here, and Pete is staring at Patrick like he owns the stars right now, and Patrick has no idea,” Dallon sighed, scratching at his eyebrow. Brendon quickly looked over the seats. It was true, “Jon has had a crush on Spencer for a while, man. Probably since you were in high school. It’s kind of sad how lovestruck he is, actually.”

 

“...Oh,” Brendon said weakly. He had no idea. 

 

“Don’t feel bad about it, I wouldn’t know either, but you know. I have this thing,” Dallon reassured, pointing up at his forehead. Brendon smiled slightly and nodded, still unsure. He felt a spike of panic at Dallon’s words, fighting to keep it down so the empath wouldn’t feel it (can he feel that every time i look at him my heart jumps oh god oh god). 

 

Brendon was just relieved that Dallon wasn’t a telepath, like he was. That would almost be worse. 

 

“We’re leaving now. Make sure to strap yourselves in, this thing goes about 100 miles faster than the regular commercial flight,” the deeper voice of Socialite filtered through the ceiling, causing everyone to look up like dogs with the promise of treats. 

 

Brendon had soon learned the differences between the two people, Socialite and Kaleidoscope Eyes. Socialite had a deeper voice, even through the filtering, and was taller; Kaleidoscope Eyes was shorter, had a higher-pitched voice, and had a sense of humor. They had laughed when Brendon made a joke about their mask (“i know that some people are into LARPing, but this is taking the whole kylo ren/darth vader thing too far”), while Socialite kept quiet. Maybe Socialite had a sense of humor, Brendon didn’t know. Maybe they had laughed on the inside. 

 

Brendon’s musing about the two, however, was quickly cut off when the plane lurched forward and he hit his head against the back of his seat. He hissed in pain; Dallon had hit his neck, and was uncomfortably rubbing the back of it. 

 

Brendon had only been on a flight once in his life, and that was back when his ADHD was medicated and his anxiety was contained. He still remembered the panic of takeoff, though, the way that he had to close his eyes and count backwards from 100, trying not to think about the fact that he was in a ginormous tube of metal that was currently entering the sky at 200 miles per hour, and could crash at any given moment. Now, he let his ADHD run its course, and he had forgotten to take his anxiety meds that morning in the rush of things. 

 

Fantastic!

 

He balled his hands into fists and closed his eyes, attempting to count back from 100 again as the plane got faster and faster. He lost track around 78, and opened his eyes again. Dallon beside him seemed to be fine, earbuds in and peacefully watching out the window, as if Brendon wasn’t directly next to him and about to combust about the amount of blind panic currently enveloping him. 

 

Feeling like his heart was going to beat out of his chest, Brendon reached out and attached himself to Dallon’s arm. Dallon blinked, tearing his dark blue eyes from the window to the sight of Brendon, clutching desperately to his arm and looking like he was about to cry.

 

Dallon’s face cleared, understanding filling his eyes as he moved the armrest and let Brendon lean against him (he had been careful after that first day and that panic attack, he had made sure to keep himself in his room every time the familiar choking feeling surfaced and this was ruining his track record. he didn’t appreciate it).

 

Brendon gasped as the plane lifted off the ground, pressure surrounding his head and shoulders and chest and making his breathlessness worse. Dallon wrapped an arm around Brendon, leaning to place his chin on the top of Brendon’s trembling head and let Brendon shake (he appreciated that this wasn’t a crying attack, because then everyone would know that brendon did not, in fact, enjoy flying through the air at unimaginable speeds with the constant chance of death). 

 

“Don’t worry, I knew someone who hated flying just as much as you do,” Dallon mumbled against Brendon’s head, so quiet that Brendon didn’t know if the words were for him or Dallon. They were quiet enough, though, that Frank and Gerard in front of them didn’t hear. Brendon was glad of that. 

 

Brendon had to learn about the fate of Breezy Weekes from Patrick, when Dallon had found an old can of Dr. Pepper and a handwritten note that had caused him to leave the room and disappear for an hour and a half. Brendon had volunteered to patch up the punched-in hole in the wall with Patrick, and the shorter man had whispered the entire story to Brendon while Dallon went to Josh, his face blank and his knuckles red. Patrick had showed him the picture hidden away in Dallon’s room, the dark-haired woman with eyes closed and blissful smile on her face, perfectly fitting under Dallon’s chin like they were the two puzzle pieces of one person.

 

Breezy had been Dallon’s wife of nine years, his steadying force and the counterpart to Dallon’s empathy; she was a telepath, just like Brendon, using her powers to explain the reasons behind the emotions that Dallon would decipher. Patrick explained to him that before he was second-in-command, before Ryan had entered the equation, Breezy was both second-in-command and advisor, a kind commanding force along with Dallon. From what Brendon could tell, Breezy was good for Dallon, helping him through his slumps and rages, and he was just as good for her, crying with her when their little girl Amelie was captured by hunters and never returned, spending long nights sitting on the bed with her and listening to her rant into the small hours of the morning.

 

But then one fateful day, a day in March that Dallon always retreated back into his room and didn't talk to anyone and often had to patch up his walls again, Breezy had gone on patrol with Dallon. They encountered a group of hunters, Breezy didn't make it. 

 

Breezy bled out in Dallon’s arms as he sprinted back to the base. 

 

Brendon often watched for signs that would set Dallon off, along with everyone else - a glass of hot chocolate (breezy’s favorite drink apparently), Doctor Who on the TV (once dallon’s favorite tv shows, apparently, but now it reminded him too much of his wife), the appearance of an old crumpled note or a long-since-worn diamond ring. Brendon noticed that Dallon still wore his, a thick steel band across his left ring finger, one that he would absent-mindedly twist when thinking hard about something or staring into space, eyes and mind far away. 

 

Brendon knew that recovery wasn't linear. He didn't question the times that Dallon would disappear, the times that he would find Dallon in the media room with tear tracks down his cheeks and his breaths shuddering. Some others were pushing for his recovery (patrick would whisper things to dallon, and dallon would turn quiet, withdraw. frank once tried to push dallon to date again, and it resulted in a fight where dallon had screamed at frank and frank, with wide eyes and hands put up, repeatedly said he was kidding), but Brendon understood that Dallon wasn't ready. 

 

He knew the person Dallon was referring to was Breezy, but he didn't call the taller man out, instead focusing on the steadying touch of Dallon and calming his breathing, determined to not fall apart on this flight.

 

After a solid five minutes, the pressure from the flight lessened as his body acclimatized to the speed and elevation, and he slightly pushed against Dallon’s grip, not hard enough to be rude, but enough to get Dallon to let go. 

 

“Thanks, um, for doing that,” Brendon stammered, nervously brushing the hair out of his face. The proximity to the taller man had caught up to him, and the nervousness transferred from the pressure in his chest to the sick feeling in his stomach, surfacing whenever someone would study Brendon too long or he embarrassed himself, “The last time I flew, I had actually taken my anxiety pills.” 

 

“You didn't take them this morning?” Dallon sounded concerned, his eyebrows drawing together as he studied Brendon closely. The smaller man squirmed uncomfortably under the scrutiny. 

 

“Uh, no,” Brendon laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck and hitting his elbow against the window; he jumped, hissing slightly. Thinking of Breezy had made him guilty of the feelings he always felt around Dallon, the fluttery feelings he hadn't felt in a long time (not since ryan, at least). Dallon still hadn't gotten over her. It wasn't fair for Brendon to feel this way. 

 

“That's not good Brendon, you should have taken them today…” Dallon’s concerned gaze was too much (he couldn't stand the thought of him looking at breezy the same exact way, how could he be jealous of a dead woman? who even was he?), and Brendon nodded quickly before getting up abruptly. 

 

“I, um, uh, bathroom,” he stuttered, and ignoring Dallon’s surprised gaze, he pushed past and swiftly walked to the bathroom at the front of the plane. 

 

“Are you okay, dude?” Jon whispered to Brendon as he passed, but the telepath ignored him, almost slamming the door behind him and collapsing onto the closed toilet seat. He would stay in here for now. Compose himself. 

 

He was completely and utterly fucked. 

 

-

 

Dallon was extremely confused about what just happened. 

 

Ryan was looking at him like he wanted to smash Dallon’s face in (dallon had heard that brendon and him had once dated, and it seemed like ryan still hadn’t lost that protective streak), Patrick was worriedly glancing to the bathroom door every few seconds, and everyone else had dissolved into gossiping in quiet tones. Dallon could hear Frank and Gerard theorizing in front of him, and resisted the urge to reach around and strangle them both. 

 

Sure, it wasn’t their business, but Dallon and Brendon had given up all kinds of  _ privacy _ when Brendon first grabbed onto Dallon’s sleeve like it was the only thing connecting him to his body. 

 

After about ten minutes, Patrick had given up on trying to see if Brendon would return, but Dallon still felt Ryan’s hard gaze burning holes into the side of his head as Dallon tried to focus on the book in front of him. It was easy to pretend this was a normal commercial flight, like the ones he would go on back and forth when visiting parents, work trips, seeing Breezy. It wasn’t easy to pretend like the guy Dallon had developed a schoolgirl crush on was currently trapped in the bathroom having a panic attack by himself, or that his ex-boyfriend/current friend was trying to slowly roast Dallon alive with his eyes alone. 

 

Luckily, just as Ryan seemed to gather up enough courage to get up and rip Dallon a new asshole, the bathroom door opened. 

 

Brendon emerged slowly, no tears on his face or evidence of him crying, but his face was still pale and his hands were still shaking slightly. Dallon tried to meet his eyes - he kept his gaze trained on the floor. 

 

“Brendon -” Ryan hissed as Brendon neared, but the telepath didn’t acknowledge him, instead pushing past Dallon’s knees again, sitting down, rifling through his backpack for his phone and earbuds, and tuning everything out, staring out the window. Dallon stared at him a moment before going back to his book, not saying anything. If Brendon didn’t want to speak, that was fine with him. 

 

He could still feel Ryan staring at him though.

 

After five minutes of uninterrupted staring, Dallon huffed and turned to, finally, meet Ryan’s gaze. If anything, the geokinetic looked even more pissed than he had before. To Dallon’s horror, he ripped off his seatbelt and stiffly, quietly, stalked his way across the three feet of the aisle. 

 

Shit.

 

“What the  _ fuck _ just happened?” he demanded, not bothering to keep his voice down. Dallon felt everyone’s eyes looking back at the three of them, and tried to sink down as low as he could so no one could see his bright red face. 

 

“I don’t think it’s your place to ask that,” Dallon replied, surprised that his voice was still steady. Brendon beside him shifted slightly, but didn’t look away from the window. 

 

“Not my  _ place _ ? Fuck that! I think that everyone wants an explanation!” Ryan shouted, and Dallon opened his mouth to retaliate, to say that,  _ no, it’s not your place, it’s your problem that you’re still this overprotective even when you two have been broken up for years - _

 

“Leave it alone, Ryan.” Brendon’s voice was tired, and both Dallon and Ryan whipped their heads around to see Brendon staring at Ryan, his jaw set and eyes hard. Ryan opened and closed his mouth, blinked once. 

 

“Please,” he continued, and Ryan finally turned and sat back down in his seat, still simmering with anger but letting it go. 

 

Dallon caught Patrick and Pete concernedly staring at him, and made a small shooing motion; he was fine. Brendon was fine (was he?), and honestly, Dallon just wanted to read this book and listen to his music and the droning of the wind outside. 

 

“Thanks,” he quietly said to Brendon, who smiled slightly and nodded. 

 

“He’s too jealous, anyway,” Brendon mumbled, putting in his earbuds again. 

 

Jealous?

 

-

 

The rest of the flight was quiet, uneventful, something Brendon was grateful for. Brendon would check his watch every so often, though, as so far two hours had passed and he was getting restless. Especially sitting next to Dallon. 

 

Brendon had thought on his  _ situation _ in the bathroom, his head held in his hands and the sound of the wind rushing past the plane uncomfortably loud in his ears. 

 

This little crush? A big problem. 

 

Brendon didn’t let himself catch feelings. Anything he’d ever had was casual, no strings attached, other than Ryan. But then Ryan had disappeared, along with everyone else he trusted in his life, so he had gone back to the inconsistency and strangers next to him in the mornings. He just didn’t get a crush. 

 

Especially not one on someone he didn’t even know if was straight or gay or bi or  _ whatever _ . It didn’t help that every so often he would catch Dallon watching him out of the corner of his eye, the taller looking closely for  _ what _ , Brendon didn’t know. His blue eyes were infuriatingly pretty. 

 

After a good two hours, Brendon felt the strange sensation of being weightless; the plane was descending. He took out one earbud, just in case the two people controlling this flying metal death tube decided to inform them when they could leave. 

 

“We’ll be on the ground in a couple minutes, make sure to get all your stuff together so you can get out quickly.” Sure enough, the high pitched voice of Kaleidoscope Eyes filtered through the speakers in the ceiling, and Dallon next to Brendon quickly snapped his eyes away from the shorter man (brendon was holding a contest with himself to see if dallon would notice that brendon had  _ definitely _ noticed the staring), shutting the book that had been open at the same page for about ten minutes awkwardly. 

 

Brendon stopped the music, taking out both earbuds and tucking them swiftly into the small backpack by his feet. In the couple months that had passed while Brendon had been with the group, he had acquired more clothes and belongings than just the skinny jeans and scar on his stomach that he had entered with. His baggage was still pitifully small, though, especially compared to others (cough cough spencer cough cough joe cough cough josh).

 

He was sure that his anxiety would spike again with touchdown (brendon faintly remembered the feeling from the only other time he had flown, and from what he could tell it seemed it was more violent than takeoff), and so to avoid getting touchy with Dallon again, he focused on Frank and Gerard’s conversation in front of him. 

 

They were talking about conspiracy theories. 

 

“... look, Gee, Dulce Base is totally real. Area 51 is just way too popular now, too many rumors circulating around it, so they had to move the aliens somewhere! I mean, they even have Area 51 on Google Maps, where Dulce Base can’t be found,” Frank was hissing to the taller man next to him, and Brendon could hear Gerard sigh. He ignored the rumbling of the engines, the slight turbulence as the plane neared the ground, the way his heart rate spiked and he stopped breathing. 

 

“Frank, that just supports the fact that it isn’t real. They’ve even had murderers on Google Maps before, they see everything,” Gerard responded tiredly, but Frank was adamant. 

 

“EXACTLY! So the government made a deal with Google, that if Google would replace their location on the map with a blank version, then they wouldn’t have to unleash their alien technology on them,” Frank snapped excitedly, and Brendon huffed in a quiet laugh. Dallon seemed to have been listening as well, snorting slightly. 

 

“I swear, Frank,” Gerard groaned, just as Dallon sighed out an, “Idiot...”

 

“I heard that, Dallon!” Frank twisted around, his honey-colored eyes narrowed dangerously at Dallon. The taller man didn’t seem fazed. 

 

“Frank, you’re about two feet tall, I wouldn’t really challenge me if I were you,” Dallon said calmly, and Gerard let out a small, “oooooooooh”. Frank turned to glare at his friend (boyfriend? brendon got those vibes from the two), and Gerard’s eyes crinkled at the edges. 

 

Brendon choked when suddenly the plane lurched, hitting the ground and then righting itself; the roar of the plane  decelerating rang in his ears, and the ground outside went by too fast. Brendon shut his mouth and his eyes, squeezing his eyelids tightly as if this wasn’t happening. He could barely hear Gerard’s high-pitched, nasally voice timidly asking, “You okay, Brendon?” over the sound of the engines working hard to slow the plane down. Brendon gulped. 

 

“I hate flying,” he squeaked out, and for once he was glad that Dallon wasn’t helping his through his panic. He knew Gerard, even in the two months he had been with this group. He knew that Gerard would gossip about the two possibly ~*~ _ having feelings _ ~*~ for each other. 

 

“Me too!” Gerard piped up, and Brendon cracked open an eye to look at the man suspiciously. The red-haired man seemed fine. 

 

“He takes Xanax for flights,” Frank explained, and Gerard winked. That… made sense, actually. Brendon would kill for some Xanax just then, “That's why he's putting up with my conspiracy theories, because he's too high to protest too much.” 

 

“Am not!” Gerard protested, shoving Frank, then dissolving into a fit of giggles when Frank disappeared for a moment, falling from his position on the seat. 

 

“You guys can get out, now,” Socialite spoke up from the front of the room, and Brendon picked his head up to see the two figures, walking out from the pilot’s cabin, above Frank and Gerard’s heads. Funny, Brendon didn't notice the plane stopping. His method had worked! 

 

Brendon was distracted from Dallon’s shuffling and shoving things into his backpack, and Frank and Gerard’s bickering as they got up, by the sight of Kaleidoscope Eyes. They didn't have their mask on anymore.

 

“Hey, don’t look now, but Kaleidoscope Eyes doesn't have that stupid mask on,” Brendon hissed quietly to Dallon, and Dallon whipped his head around as conspicuously as possible. His blue eyes searched for the figure (who was now  _ definitely _ a woman, she had delicate features, wavy dark brown hair and the biggest blue eyes brendon had ever seen, even bluer than dallon’s), finally landing on the small woman. 

 

Brendon had to admit, she was very pretty (very pretty? who was he kidding? she was beautiful). The name suited her.

 

Kaleidoscope Eyes looked slightly uncomfortable as more and more of the group noticed that, hey, she didn't have that creepy mask on anymore! but she toughed it out, lifting up her chin. 

 

Brendon waited as Dallon slipped out into the aisle, and he rushed forward as Kaleidoscope Eyes neared him. He timed it perfectly; he was walking next to the shorter woman. Socialite stayed silent, but Brendon could tell from the direction of their head that they were staring at the back of Dallon’s head sticking out above everyone else’s. Brendon chuckled at the tall man (socialite seemed to  _ really _ like dallon. who could blame them? certainly not brendon).

 

“Your name  _ really  _ isn't Kaleidoscope Eyes, is it?” Brendon asked mischievously, and Kaleidoscope Eyes startled next to him before turning to look at him with those doe eyes. 

 

“... No, it isn’t. My name’s Sarah,” she responded shyly, but her eyes were sparkling with humor. 

 

Hey, he didn't even know if Dallon was attracted to guys. He could flirt with her if he wanted. 

 

“My name’s Brendon, but I think you knew that,” Brendon smirked, and Sarah grinned. 

 

“I didn't actually, but I like that name,” she replied, and Socialite shifted beside her. Brendon was glad that the flirting was mutual. 

 

And just like that, he ran out of witty things to say. She was still staring up at him with those enormous blue eyes, and he started to get nervous. 

 

(say something say something say anything just keep the conversation going)

 

“Ditto,” he said, and Sarah laughed. He felt his cheeks heat up slightly (ditto?  _ ditto? _ ), and Sarah looked at him adoringly. 

 

Suddenly, Brendon had the urge to kiss her. He pushed it away, of course (he wasn't the type to go around kissing almost-strangers, not when he was going to be around them for extended amounts of time, that is), and he was slightly startled at the thought, but he continued to chat with Sarah as they stepped out into the bright Colorado sunshine. He learned that she could control illusions, at which Brendon cocked his head to the side in confusion. She laughed, saying he looked like a puppy before explaining. 

 

“It's sort of hard to say exactly what it is, but I can bend the light around me to make you see things that aren't really there. Like mirages,” She explained, and she waved a hand. Suddenly, instead of seeing Sarah’s soft, delicate features and short stature, he was seeing a tall man in a dark suit walking beside him, in a  _ desert _ nonetheless. Brendon blinked in surprise, and Sarah and the mountains and plains were back, Sarah shyly smiling as if searching for approval. 

 

“That's so cool! So it's like shapeshifting, sort of, but you can control the surroundings, too,” Brendon said in awe. Sarah nodded. 

 

“Sorry to interrupt, but we’re here at the base,” Socialite cut off Sarah’s response, and Sarah changed, straightening up and face morphing into a stoic expression. She turned to Brendon, letting a small smile pass before walking to the front with Socialite. Brendon felt his heart jump (the same way it did with dallon, oh no), and stopped dead in his tracks for a moment.

 

So now he had a crush on Dallon  _ and _ Sarah. 

 

Since when had he gained such a big heart?

 

-

 

Dallon wasn't jealous of Kaleidoscope Eyes. Nope. Nada. Not one bit. 

 

He just wished Brendon would be that forward with him, that's all. 

 

_ That was it. _

 

He wasn't deaf. He had heard Brendon flirting with Kaleidos -  _ Sarah _ \- behind him, just as he felt Socialite carefully watching him. It was still creepy that they hadn't given up their staring streak at Dallon, and so he had given up. Oh well, at least they weren’t approaching him. That would be worse. 

 

He didn't care if Brendon was attracted to Sarah. He didn't have the authority to control who anyone could date (well, technically as leader, he could, but he also wanted people to like him), and he certainly couldn't control people’s feelings (he could, in fact). He was being completely honest. 

 

He didn't care. 

 

Socialite and Sarah approached the two steel doors leading into the formidable, threatening building (if the storage building was big, this place was about double the size), talking to each other almost silently before Socialite entered in a code, and the doors opened automatically with a slight whirring noise. 

 

Okay, they had money. That was fine. It didn't intimidate him at all. 

 

“Make yourselves at home, we’ll go notice the others,” Sarah said cheerfully, and the two disappeared into the labyrinthine halls, leaving the 19 of them to fend for themselves. Dallon pretended he didn't see Brendon looking longingly back at Sarah. 

 

_ He wasn't jealous _ .

 

“Goddamn, what did we get ourselves into?” Billie breathed behind him, and Dallon shook his head slowly in agreement. This whole journey had been on a whim and they had put all their trust into two people (who they didn't even know their identities). Dallon suddenly felt hyperaware of his surroundings and everyone else’s surface emotions (not surprisingly, a lot of them were confused, overwhelmed, and pretty paranoid), and he took in a deep breath to steel himself.

 

“Hey - Ashley! Halsey! Hey!” Josh suddenly called as a girl with short pink hair walked past, and she whipped her head around, a deadly glare on her face before recognizing the yellow-haired man. Dallon and Patrick gave each other a confused look - they weren’t expecting this turn of events.

 

“Hey, Josh!” she said happily, running over to give Josh a hug. She was barely shorter than Josh, maybe Patrick and Frank’s height, with a sharp jawline and killer looks. Dallon was honestly a bit afraid of her. 

 

“Is this the Halsey that can control both light and sound?” Brendon asked, and Ashley/Halsey let go of Josh to turn and look Brendon up and down.

 

“The one and only,” she said smoothly, winking at Brendon. 

 

_ He wasn’t jealous he wasn’t jealous hewasntjealous _ .

 

“All the local theatre companies would kill to have me,” she continued, and it took a moment for Dallon to understand the joke. Theatre… lights and sound… har de har har. 

 

Dallon didn’t realize that he was glowering at Ashley/Halsey before she looked at him and did a double take, her eyebrows shooting up. 

 

“Well, I can tell who’s the one in charge,” she said, and stepped up to gently pat Dallon on the cheek. He’d never felt more patronized, “Don’t worry, honey, I’m not flirting with your boyfriend.”

 

Dallon’s cheeks immediately began to burn, and he could hear Billie and Ryan choke behind him. Everyone looked surprised to some degree (joe and patrick had winced in sympathy, and ray looked like he was suffering from severe secondhand embarrassment), but Brendon had the nerve to look confused. 

 

_ Confused _ .

 

“I - he - we're - I'm not - we're not dating,” Dallon stammered, and Ashley/Halsey didn't look convinced, but let it go. 

 

“Besides, I already have the best girlfriend ever, and even  _ he _ ,” she continued, pointing towards Brendon, “couldn't make me straight.”

 

Dallon felt even more ridiculous and stupid, shutting his mouth (it was hanging open? he didn't remember opening it) and keeping silent. 

 

“C’mon, Ashley, leave him alone for a bit. Could you help us figure out where we’re supposed to put our stuff?” Josh interrupted before anyone could say anything else, and Ashley/Halsey smiled and nodded, starting to walk toward the hallway to the left. 

 

Dallon’s skin was crawling and he felt abnormally hot as he followed Ashley/Halsey (okay seriously which one was it), ignoring the snickers and Patrick’s pitying expression. 

 

Brendon, bless him, didn't seem to realize what had just happened. 

 

Dallon kept his head down, forcefully willing away the redness on his face until he was certain that he no longer looked like a strawberry. The perks of being an empath - you can remove any blush within moments. 

 

Ashley/Halsey pointed out other people on the way to  _ wherever _ they were going, keeping up a steady stream of commentary, “That’s Lyn-z, with the pigtails, and then Lyndsey, with that one part of her hair shaved… try not to mix the two up, but we all make mistakes. Then there’s Lana, she’s the one with the flower crown and sunglasses indoors, she’s very melodramatic, and then Hayley with the orange hair… Melanie, the sweetest person  _ and _ my girlfriend, she’s the one with the black and white Cruella De Vil hair… there’s Marina, she’s the one with the short black hair, she’s from Wales and has the coolest accent… There’s Elisa and Marie, Elisa’s the really tiny one with curly hair and Marie is the taller one, obviously. Over there’s also Megan, the really pretty one… then Jenna, the blonde girl over by the couch, and Adrienne, Linda…” 

 

Dallon’s head was swimming with the amount of names being thrown at him, and he didn’t seem to be the only one; Tyler was trying to associate everyone with their names, his head swinging wildly to get a visual of everyone, and Mikey looked like Ashley/Halsey had just personally insulted his mother. He had stopped listening after the fourteenth, or maybe fifteenth name (he already had 19 names to remember himself, and it didn’t help that two days previous he had accidentally called mikey brendon, frank, and then joe, respectively, before he finally recalled the proper name), instead focusing on where Ashley was leading them. That was more important that names at this point. 

 

When they passed the same room with the two Lyndsey/Lindsey’s and Lana for the  _ third _ time, Dallon was getting suspicious. 

 

“I’m grateful for all the names, but where are we supposed to be going, again?” he cut across Ashley/Halsey’s monologue, and she blinked for a moment before recovering, “It’s just, we’ve been pulling around these bags for almost fifteen minutes now.”

 

“Oh yeah, that. You can just leave them in this room, we’ll take care of them later.”

 

Fantastic, they had been dragging around these pieces of luggage for, again, almost fifteen minutes. That was just… fan-fucking-tastic. Dallon tried to not let the anger show on his face, or spread to the others, but he didn’t seem to need to. Everyone was a degree of annoyed, grumbling as they slung their backpacks off their backs and rolling/pulling their bags over to the far wall. 

 

“Besides, we’re going to be doing much more important things - hey, Lyndsey!” Ashley/Halsey called over to the three people gathered, and both Lyn-z’s heads turned, “Get everyone in the living room, we’re giving these nerds their initiations.”

 

Lyn-z (was that the one with the pigtails?) grinned, and Lyndsey nodded before pushing a small button that Dallon hadn’t noticed before, appropriately labelled “Call button”. That would’ve been useful in the old place, Dallon, Patrick and Ryan had to individually lose their voices screaming the other’s names to get anyone in the media room. 

 

“Inititation?” Dan said nervously, the tone in his voice reflected on his facial expression. Dallon was a little put off, himself. 

 

“Don’t worry, it’s just a silly little thing. You’ll find out in a bit,” Ashley/Halsey winked at Dan, who looked more flustered than before. 

 

Okay, so Ashley/Halsey was a flirt. Dallon could live with that. 

 

Of course, a “silly little thing” meant that as soon as the door shut behind the final person (ryan), Dallon was unceremoniously attacked and a black pillowcase was shoved over his head.

 

He could hear the other’s reactions to similar attacks, and could certainly feel them (there was a heavy blanket of terror and confusion hanging over them, mixed with a suspicious overtone of excitement and amusement, he assumed from the girls) as he was forced to his knees, his hands aggressively tugged behind his back and tied. 

 

Dallon waited with baited breath as the rest of his group was put in the same position (or so he assumed), waiting for whatever horror the women had planned for them. Several agonizing moments passed, the ragged sounds of his own breathing loud in his ears, until…

 

The fabric was ripped from his head, and he winced from the bright light in his eyes; the room was lit up in typical candelight, and a flashlight was shining directly into his eyes. How cliche of them. 

 

“Yeah, could we skip the dramatic shit and just go to the important part?” he croaked before the holder of the flashlight could get in a word (he couldn’t see much beyond the blinding light, and his eyes were beginning to water from the strength of the brightness). 

 

There was a moment of silence, and Dallon took it to shift from his uncomfortable position of leaning back on his heels, instead wriggling until his legs were in front of his body. His hands were still tied, though, and he could feel them slowly growing numb. 

 

“This is tradition,” the flashlight holder finally said, and Dallon faintly recognized a heavy Wales accent - so it was that Marina girl that was blinding him.

 

“Is it tradition to blind your new recruits?” he snapped back, having enough of the banter. 

 

“Marina, stop shining that damn flashlight in his eyes and untie his hands,” a new voice sighed, and the flashlight was immediately taken away, the candles the only sources of remaining light. Even better, Marina quickly scuttled over and undid the knot that was binding his hands together; Dallon immediately drew his arms forward, glaring at the women around him as he rubbed his wrists. 

 

“Oh, don’t look so victimized, we were going to let you go after a minute,” the woman who Dallon remembered as Lyndsey scoffed, and Dallon quickly looked back at his friends to avoid any more scolding. 

 

Marina and who he remembered as Elisa were making quick work of freeing the others, Marina removing the pillowcases and Elisa untying their hands, and after a moment all 19 of them were sitting there uncomfortably, anxiously. 

 

“So, care to explain why you attacked us?” Pete said drily, and the answer was immediate. 

 

“Initiation!” Hayley (orange hair, dallon remembered) exclaimed, and the girls started to chatter excitedly. 

 

“Yes, but explain,” Pete insisted, and the pretty girl (megan) gave him a look. He shut up. 

 

“Be patient for a second, we’ll tell you after you stand up,” she said, and Pete nervously exchanged looks with Patrick and Dallon before standing. The rest followed, Dallon included, and the girls made quick work of them (he felt like a sheep being herded around), until they were all in a circle, the women quickly joining the men. 

 

“Now, sit again,” Marina commanded, and suddenly Dallon felt a heavy pressure on his shoulders - his knees buckled, and he fell heavily to the ground, groaning slightly. No one else was subjected to the same treatment; Dallon guessed it was his punishment for snapping at the Welsh woman. 

 

Another intense moment passed, Ashley/Halsey leaning over to whisper to Jenna about  _ something _ . Jenna laughed. 

 

Finally,  _ finally _ , Lyn-z spoke up. 

 

“As part of the New Generation of Naturals,” she said in a loud voice, carrying across the room, “You have to choose a new name to conceal your identity, to protect against the evils that search for and kill us. We will go around, telling you our name masks, so that you may have inspiration.” 

 

“How fancy,” Kenny muttered from beside Dallon, and Dallon held back a laugh. How true. 

 

“I’ll go first. My name is Summertime,” Lyn-z continued, then Ashley/Halsey next to her started to speak. 

 

“Halsey.” Ah, so that was it. Ashley was her normal name, then. 

 

“Torn Heart,” Jenna followed Ashley. 

 

“Cry Baby.” Melanie spoke next. 

 

“Primadonna Girl,” Marina said after the shorter girl. 

 

“Summertime Sadness,” Lana said softly, and Dallon resisted the urge to frown. Making things hard again, huh?

 

“St. Patrick,” Lyndsey said. 

 

“Spotlight,” for Elisa. 

 

“Misery Business,” for Hayley. 

 

“Handsome Woman,” Linda said. 

 

“80,” Adrienne chirped. 

 

“American Beauty,” Megan said, and then Marie was the only one left. 

 

“The Phoenix.” 

 

Again, the number of names was overwhelming for Dallon, and he shut his eyes briefly to concoct a list and organize his thoughts. 

 

(lyn-z is summertime, the  _ other _ lyndsey is st. patrick, ashley is halsey, jenna is torn heart, melanie is cry baby, marina is primadonna girl, lana is summertime sadness, elisa is spotlight, hayley is misery business, linda is handsome woman, adrienne is 80, megan is american beauty, and finally marie is the phoenix) 

 

It only helped slightly. 

 

It took a moment for Dallon to notice that the others were staring at him, waiting for a response. He startled and blushed slightly before clearing his throat and trying not to look so flustered. 

 

“I, uh… I guess my new name is…” he floundered for a moment, opening and closing his mouth, before leaping on the first thought that popped into his head, “Sentimental Boy.” 

 

Kenny snorted at the (unintentional, mind you) pun, and then continued with his name. 

 

Dallon spaced out for a moment, attempting to add his own friends to the mental list so that he could keep track of this new “code” of names. Kenny was Disco Queen, courtesy of Brendon, Dan was Hurricane, Jon was Mad Rabbit, Spencer was Crazy Genius, Ryan was Green Gentleman, and Brendon was LA Devotee.

 

“URIELECTRIC!” he had shouted at first, Ryan immediately retaliating. 

 

“Brendon, that’s fucking dumb,” Ryan sneered, and Brendon gasped in mock offense. 

 

“Y’know what else is fucking dumb? You,” he said back, and Ryan blinked in shock for a moment as everyone “oooooooooh”ed. 

 

Pete, Patrick, Joe, and Andy replied scarily quick in succession - Mr. Sandman, Dr. Benzedrine, Horseshoe Crab, and Donnie the Catcher, respectively. 

 

“How did you -” Dallon asked, before Pete cut him off. 

 

“We came up with these in high school, when we were making personas for one of our albums,” he explained, and Dallon remembered Pete telling him one time of his old band Fall Out Boy. 

 

Gerard, Mikey, Frank and Ray seemed to be in the same boat; Gerard answered for all of them, almost immediately (party poison for gerard, kobra kid for mikey, fun ghoul for frank, jet star for ray). 

 

“Those comics I'm always drawing? Those are the characters,” Gerard quickly explained at Dallon’s expression. By then, Billie, Mike, Tré, Tyler and Josh were the only ones left. 

 

Tyler named himself Blurryface, and Josh named himself Spooky Jim. Billie was American Idiot, Mike was Jesus of Suburbia, and Tré… 

 

“No,” Dallon said firmly, leaning towards the older man, “You are  _ not  _ calling yourself Dominated Love Slave.” 

 

Tré had a shit-eating grin on his face, and from behind Dallon he could hear Hayley and Linda laughing. He didn't care - he was the leader, he made the rules. 

 

“... fine, I’ll be St. Jimmy,” Tré compromised, and Dallon leaned back to where he was sitting again, glaring once more at the invincible man before turning back to where Lyn-z was looking amused. 

 

“Now that that's done, we only have one thing left in our initiation,” she said, and Halsey handed her a large cup, full to the brim of a red liquid, “We will drink the blood of our fallen.” 

 

Dallon saw Patrick’s face pale and Frank began to look excited, and Elisa laughed at the blond’s expression. 

 

“It's not blood, it's just wine,” she reassured, but Patrick looked only half convinced.

 

The cup was passed around slowly, each person taking a drink (this was a quick way to get sick, dallon thought drily), but it only got to Adrienne before the door opened and Socialite and Sarah walked in. 

 

“Initiation?” Sarah asked good-naturedly, and Lyn-z shrugged, suddenly shy. 

 

“Hey, Breezy, why are you still wearing that stupid mask?” Jenna asked suddenly, and Dallon’s head snapped up. He heard his friends erupt into panicky whispers. 

 

The world seemed to freeze as Socialite awkwardly stopped walking, looking over to Dallon before hesitantly undoing the mask. 

 

_ No _ . She had  _ died,  _ she was  _ dead _ , there was absolutely no way _ \-  _

 

The mask came off, and the woman who Dallon had held as she died stood in front of him.

 

“Breezy?” he said in a choked voice, and she smiled sheepishly. 

 

-

 

Oh,  _ shit. _

 

The women didn't seem to know why Dallon was acting the way he was, but every one of the men seemed to be having some form of a freak out. Patrick and Ryan had grouped together and were panickedly whisper-shouting to each other, Gerard, Frank and Mikey were exchanging bits of words and sentences, Billie, Mike, and Tre were all concernedly staring at the younger man. Pete, Joe, Jon and Spencer were talking in hushed tones, looking over at their leader, and the remaining five were stock still in a state of shock. 

 

Dallon ignored everyone else however, scrambling up to tower over his (ex? dallon was still wearing his ring) wife. Breezy was looking extremely guilty, nervously rubbing her hands together. 

 

Sarah seemed to sense a confrontation, putting a finger to her lips at the others and then silently sitting down, far away from the two. It was almost as if Dallon and Breezy were the performers, and the others were the audience. Brendon felt enormously uncomfortable witnessing this, but he supposed this had to happen. 

 

“How?” Dallon asked after a moment, his voice pained and very quiet. He seemed to be on the verge of tears. 

 

“It was a closed casket, anyone could've been in there,” she began, but Dallon cut her off. 

 

“No - I - that's not what I - why?” he stuttered, anger and desperation creeping into his voice. Breezy tried to put a hand on his shoulder; Dallon jerked it back violently. 

 

“I… it was planned. The attackers… were, uh, Megan and Lyndsey, and they followed us when you carried me off,” she explained, avoiding his question. 

 

“ _ Why? _ ” Dallon repeated, and Brendon squeezed his eyes shut and turned away as he saw tears run down the taller man’s cheeks. He couldn't just watch this.

 

There was a long moment of silence, Breezy seemingly steeling herself for Dallon’s reaction. Brendon opened his eyes again, but kept the angle of his head pointed toward the ground, watching from the corner of his eye. Dallon didn’t need to know that he just sat and watched this entire interaction without doing anything. 

 

“... we weren't doing anything with the group, Dallon, and I wasn't happy… we needed to acknowledge the danger we were in, but in reality we were just playing games while other Naturals, other  _ people _ were being murdered, Dallon,” Breezy pleaded softly, going forward to touch Dallon’s shoulder again. 

 

Dallon shuffled backwards quickly, away from Breezy’s comforting touch. 

 

“And so you decided to  _ fake _ your  _ death _ ?” he snarled, the anger coming forward through his tears. 

 

“I had to do something -”

 

“ _ You could’ve talked to me! _ ” Dallon screamed, the sadness and anger prevalent in his raw voice. The air rang with the force of those words, Dallon’s breathing and barely-restrained sobs the only sounds to be heard. Brendon shifted his head slightly, to see better; Breezy was standing, frozen, and Dallon was maybe five feet from her, his cheeks shining from tears and his face set in a furious snarl. 

 

“I - Dallon… I’m sorry…”, Breezy attempted, and Dallon scoffed angrily. 

 

“ _ Sorry _ doesn’t  _ cut it _ ,” he snapped, and suddenly Brendon felt a nagging annoyance of fury in the back of his mind, a dull thorn of hurt in his chest. He fought it back; Dallon was losing control of his powers, and projecting his feelings onto the others. Breezy appeared to have felt it as well, and her expression changed, turning from apologetic and guilty to firm. 

 

“Dallon, you’re being stupid,” she said, and Brendon winced. Bad word choice. 

 

Dallon drew himself up to his full height, seeming to puff up with anger - Breezy stood, unflinchingly, in his direct path. Brendon held his breath, waiting for any sort of violence. Dallon wasn’t one to hit anyone, much less his (once-been) significant other, but he was also hurting and didn’t seem to be in control of his actions. Brendon saw Patrick preparing to go and restrain his friend (as if his 5’4” frame could prevent anything), along with Ryan beside him. 

 

They had prepared for the absolute worst, however; Dallon took a step forward before letting out a frustrated, absolutely  _ miserable _ noise, backing up quickly as he tugged at his hair, as if to ground himself. A few moments passed as he squeezed his eyes shut, contemplating his options; he let go of his hair, glared at Breezy for a good ten seconds, and promptly left, slamming the door behind him with such force that the walls shook. 

 

Breezy let out a breath and fell back from the stiff posture she had keeping - Brendon released his breath, as well, finally moving his head to completely look at the front of the room. He didn’t know Breezy at all, only stories and the one picture, but in this moment she seemed small. Hurt, just as much if not more than Dallon (well, not more. she did fake her death and now he had just found out after a year of agony, which was kind of just an altogether shitty situation). 

 

“Breezy, who the hell was that?” Marie finally asked, and Breezy moved to see her friends. She looked uncomfortable. 

 

“My, uh… husband. The one that I left,” she said quietly, stiffly, as if she couldn’t admit it to herself. Apparently, the only ones that knew of the full situation were Megan and Lyndsey (as they were the ones who ‘killed’ breezy). Elisa and Jenna gaped at the taller woman, Halsey, Melanie, and Marina all gave each other surprised looks, Sarah was staring hard at her friend (brendon wondered if they had the same dynamic as dallon and patrick, and if there was the equivalent to ryan in their group), and Lyn-z, Adrienne, Linda, Lana and Hayley were whispering together. 

 

Brendon looked away from Breezy to Patrick, who was talking in a low voice to Ryan. He caught the shorter man’s eyes, and Patrick made a small motion to indicate for Brendon to come over there. 

 

Brendon obeyed. 

 

“We’re going to find Dallon, do you think you can track his surface thoughts to where he is?” Ryan murmured as soon as Brendon had scooted over, and Brendon blinked in surprise. Ray would’ve been the better choice, but sure, he could do it. 

 

“Yeah,” he responded, and Patrick nodded once before standing up, Ryan and Brendon quickly following. Brendon’s skin crawled as thirty pairs of eyes migrated all at once to their three forms; he shivered, wrapping his arms protectively around himself. He hated when other people stared. 

 

Once out the door, Patrick looked expectantly at Brendon. He shut his eyes, concentrating for a moment as his mind’s eye acclimatized to the new surroundings. Soon enough, however, Brendon heard the angry, brokenhearted thoughts of Dallon. He seemed to be lost, and Brendon soon realized they would be, too, if he stopped concentrating. 

 

He thrust his arm out toward where he thought Ryan was - he was accurate, his hand hitting something warm that flinched as he hit it. He fought off a smile as the thin man gasped before grumbling. 

 

“What the - Brendon, what the hell do you want?”

 

“Guide me around, we’re playing a game of Find Dallon, and I can’t really tell you where he is, because he’s just as confused as we are,” Brendon said, trying to keep the amused tone out his voice. It worked,  _ barely _ , and Brendon felt Patrick take his other hand as the two started to walk forward. 

 

“To the left - wait no, the right, sorry… walk forward a bit, a little bit more, TURN TO THE RIGHT!... okay walk forward until you get to the wall, or at least I think there’s a wall. Dallon’s a jumble of thoughts right now, then turn left… turn left again, and then walk forward until it splits off into two halls, and go into the right one… wait, no left one! Left one! Or right one? I’ll go with the left one, he seems more sure about that… we’re getting warmer, turn down this hallway and he’s locked himself in a room near here,” Brendon instructed, failing at not smiling. 

 

“Brendon, I swear to god if he’s not there -” Ryan snapped angrily, and Brendon shot away from him, crashing into Patrick, who squawked. 

 

“He’s in this room!” Brendon whisper-shouted, opening his eyes to see that he was standing in front of a solid, locked door. Brendon pressed his ear to the door, putting a finger to his lips at Ryan and Patrick (ryan looked pissed and patrick exasperated, but they didn’t want to risk dallon running off again). He could faintly hear Dallon crying, muffled either from distance or the thickness of the door. 

 

Patrick and Ryan quickly joined Brendon in listening, Ryan's expression morphing from annoyance at Brendon to concern and pity, Patrick looking like the equivalent of Dallon’s sobs. 

 

“Dallon, is that you?” It was a rhetorical question, but Patrick still asked it so that it seemed like Brendon didn't just go into his mind and find out where he was. The crying stopped briefly, and only sniffling could be heard for a moment. 

 

“Who's with you?” Dallon finally asked, and Brendon’s heart ached at the broken tone of his voice. He also remembered that Dallon could probably sense three people’s worth of emotions through the door just now, so he tried to mask his emotions ( _ tried _ ). 

 

“Brendon and Ryan,” Patrick answered honestly. There was another pause, Dallon seeming to decide whether or not to let them in. Brendon felt an impulse to go into his thoughts again, but didn't do it. 

 

“The door’s unlocked, you can come in,” he said quietly after what felt like eternity, and Brendon almost enthusiastically opened up the door. 

 

Dallon was sitting on the counter in the small room (it seemed like this was a sort of entertainment room, with a food-preparation area, a dining table, and an open space), and he looked pathetic, his eyes red-rimmed and his cheeks slick with tears, his breath shuddering and still sniffling. He was so sad-looking that Brendon was overwhelmed with a feeling of protectiveness- he acted on it, rushing forward to wrap Dallon up in a tight hug. 

 

Patrick joined in after a moment, hugging the left side of Brendon and right side of Dallon, Ryan soon following suit and hugging the other side; Dallon crumpled, burying his face into Brendon’s shoulder and starting to sob again. 

 

“It - it's not fair,” Dallon gasped, and Brendon said nothing (he had never been in a situation like this before, and he was fairly certain that patrick and ryan hadn't either, so he didn't really have any idea what to do), only pulling him closer. 

 

Suddenly, Dallon pushed Brendon away forcefully; he stumbled backwards, almost hitting the wall. Patrick and Ryan were sent reeling as well, and Dallon curled in on himself. 

 

“What the fuck, Dallon?” Ryan hissed before reigning himself in, realizing that  _ maybe _ it wasn't a good idea to yell at a man who just found out his dead wife was now, in fact, not dead. 

 

“Get out.” Dallon’s voice had changed from hurt to quiet and firm. Brendon was baffled.

 

“I… what?” Patrick voiced Brendon’s thoughts, the shorter man’s eyebrows drawn together in confusion. 

 

“Get  _ out _ .” Now his tone was venomous, and Dallon moved backward to create more space. Brendon started to get annoyed, picking himself up from where he was on the ground, where he had landed when Dallon had pushed him. 

 

“We’re trying to  _ help- _ ,” Brendon tried to say, and a glass jar than had been behind Dallon was thrown at his head. Brendon ducked, barely, squeaking and throwing himself down onto the floor. The jar shattered against the wall, leaving a mark. 

 

Dallon looked up from his position on the counter, angry and hurt and… was that regret…? But Brendon pushed it away. Dallon had just thrown a glass item at him, he really couldn’t feel sympathy at this point. 

 

“Okay, fine! Go through this alone! We tried to help you, we’ve been trying to help you move past Breezy for the past  _ year and a half _ , and now you go and do  _ this _ !” Ryan shouted, coming to protectively move in front of both Patrick and Brendon (as if his skinny twig frame could do much against the altogether bigger man in front of him, but it was the thought that counted). 

 

There was definitely some regret in Dallon’s eyes now, but he seemed to realize that he had gone too far, and he just…  _ gave up _ . 

 

“Please,” he said after a moment, his voice cracking on the “s”. 

 

Ryan dragged Brendon and Patrick out of the room before Dallon could say anything more, slamming the door shut on his way out. Brendon quickly ripped himself from his friend’s grasp, snapping that he was perfectly capable of walking,  _ thank you very much _ , but Patrick looked like he was going through the seven stages of grief all in one minute. 

 

“What… the fuck… does he think… he’s  _ doing _ ?” Ryan ground out between clenched teeth, supporting Patrick’s weight as they walked back to where they thought the initiation room had been. If the others were even in there anymore. 

 

“He’s hurt, and he just found out that his wife left him by faking her own death -” Brendon tried to defend the man they had just left, and Ryan let out a bitter, harsh laugh. 

 

“That doesn’t excuse that he threw a glass jar at you, Brendon. It doesn’t excuse that he tried to hurt you.” 

 

Brendon kept silent after that, not wanting to incur Ryan’s wrath. He carefully reached back toward Dallon with his mind, masking his presence just like he had practiced. He tried to keep himself from flinching when he heard the barbed wire words Dallon was throwing at himself, blaming himself for Breezy’s actions, repeatedly ripping himself to shreds. 

 

( _ he tried to hurt you he threw something at you he’s made his position clear _ ) 

 

Brendon’s own thoughts didn’t make him feel any better. 

 

-

 

Dallon just kept… digging his own grave, deeper and deeper. He had started to keep a mental list of things he’d fucked up ever since Bree-  _ she _ had shown up in his life again, and he added to it every day or so. 

 

Dallon was nothing if not consistent. 

 

(jon - screamed at him after he failed to keep his promise of getting dallon a pack of waters on his run to the supermarket, making the shapeshifter dissolve into tears.)

(tyler and josh - made a snide remark about  _ joshler _ and who was the girl of the relationship when tyler tried to joke about dallon eating a popsicle, now tyler won’t look him in the eye and josh always says “oops, better not say that around  _ dallon _ ” whenever someone makes a joke.)

(melanie - effectively tore her down and made sure there was never going to be a positive relationship between them when he snapped at her and called her a crybaby when she and ashley had a fight. ashley now hates him just as much as any of the SICEA members.)

(frank and joe - they were having one of their bickering fights again, and dallon had a migraine that day. he told them that if they didn’t clean up their act, they would both die in any kind of fight and honestly, he didn’t know if he would miss them. they didn’t talk to him anymore.)

(patrick and ryan - after that first encounter, ryan seems to be in a constant watchful and angry state. patrick tried to keep things friendly, but when dallon snapped at him after patrick made an incorrect prediction once, he gave up.)

(tre and mike - billie was gone one day and they were in charge of the preparations. tre had forgotten once again that no one else was invincible, and hurt spencer accidentally. it was nothing major, just a fractured wrist, but dallon exploded. billie caught wind of what dallon had screamed at his two friends, and stopped dallon from contributing to the preparations.)

(brendon - threw a glass jar at him to get him to stop talking. brendon, just like patrick, tried to keep things light and friendly, but when he told dallon about sarah and how nice she was, dallon flipped. he called sarah a “gold-digging, slutty, shallow bitch”, brendon called him a “self-centered asshole who won’t even face his problems”. now brendon glares at him whenever they’re in a room together, and sarah looks like dallon’s a ticking time bomb.)

 

That last one hurt the most. Even despite all his actions, he still kept that  _ goddamned crush _ on Brendon, no matter how much Dallon screamed at himself to  _ let him go, he hates you he fucking hates you you deserve it he hates you just like breezy hates you he’s going to leave just like she did-  _

 

Dallon slapped his forehead to stop the thoughts, ignoring the few looks and pitying glances in response. Even if he hadn’t personally yelled at everyone in the base yet, his actions to those few others had been widely viewed. He was honestly surprised that no one had chewed  _ him _ out yet. 

 

Besides, that last thought was unrealistic. Breezy was a different person than Brendon, and Brendon didn’t have the kind of relationship Dallon had with Breezy to be able to make as much of an impact. Plus, he’d seen Brendon together with Sarah. Brendon was sweet, funny and kind to Sarah, and Dallon had to admit that Sarah was just as nice as Brendon had said she was, adorable and helpful. He always felt guilty when Sarah flinched whenever Dallon raised his voice in the training sessions. 

 

It hurt too much to think of that, and Dallon got up from his sitting position at the counter. It was sometime in the afternoon, and Dallon was on his fifth cup of coffee that day. Which day that was, Dallon had no idea. He'd lost track some time last month. 

 

Putting his mug in the sink, neatly placing it as to not interfere with the stream of water, Dallon listened behind him to see if anyone was talking about him. They knew better, of course (they didn’t want another ‘daltonation’, as they’ve started to call his outbursts), but he was still paranoid. 

 

Paranoid was what he seemed to be a lot those days. 

 

Stepping out into the hallway, he started walking. Where, he didn’t know. He only acted on impulses, turning left whenever his heart quickened or turning right whenever his stomach started to feel particularly fluttery. 

 

He passed by Joe - he didn’t acknowledge Dallon’s existence, only raising his voice as he talked to Andy animatedly about telekinesis techniques and how  _ much _ Billie was helping him and how  _ good _ of a teacher the immortal man was. Dallon ignored him as well, not returning the glance that Andy gave him. 

 

Turn left, immediately right, straight on and past the slightly open door where he could hear Brendon and Sarah talking quietly - 

 

Dallon paused. 

 

He knew, deep in his mind, that if he didn't want people listening in on him or talking about him behind his back or even  _ looking _ at him weirdly, and he had multiple meltdowns because of this, he shouldn't do it to others. He didn't want to become even more hated, but then again, he was a hypocrite at heart… 

 

Dallon’s eyes flicked up to the sign on the door, which announced that the room that Sarah and Brendon were in was, in fact, the kitchen (he distantly remembered brendon telling him that they were going in there to go get snacks, and that was quite a time ago, so he had a perfectly reasonable ((if false)) excuse to go in there). He debated with himself once more before stepping forward to push the door open. 

 

He failed to hear that the room had turned silent a few moments before. 

 

Dallon choked in surprise and froze completely as he saw Brendon… and,  _ Sarah _ …  _ kissing _ . Kissing. Making out. Brendon had his hand on Sarah’s thigh (she was sitting on the counter, of course she was), one of her hands was on his jaw and the other in his hair, his right hand was slowly creeping up to lift her shirt so that Dallon could see the pale skin of her stomach… His head turned slightly fuzzy as he took in the scene. 

 

“What in the actual  _ fuck _ are you doing?” Dallon found his voice, although his choked and quiet voice didn't quite match the words he was spitting. The strange thing was, he didn't feel the typical fire-hot, overwhelming feeling of rage and fury, or even the suffocating blanket of jealousy that had been wrapped around his shoulders for numerous days. He felt completely numb, his hands and feet feeling like the static of a broken TV.

 

He didn't know if that was good or bad yet.

 

Brendon and Sarah leapt apart, Sarah’s cheeks growing even redder, Brendon hurriedly fixing his hair and crooked shirt. 

 

“... Dallon,” Brendon greeted after a moment, his voice croaky and breaking in the middle of the name. Dallon felt as if his feet were bolted to the floor, his throat cauterized as to block the words gradually building up. 

 

The silence grew longer and heavier, Dallon struggling to speak. He wasn't allowed to be jealous, not technically (it was a crush, only a crush), and the envy he had been expecting to feel was only a nagging annoyance in the back of his mind. Brendon and Sarah continued to look more and more embarrassed, Sarah’s cheeks getting darker and darker red, Brendon staring and Dallon with a growing anger. 

 

Finally, Brendon snapped at Dallon. 

 

“What do you want?” he snarled, and Dallon blinked slowly. 

 

“I… sorry. I was looking for… food, yeah, snacks,” Dallon finally found his voice, speaking slowly before realizing where he was and regaining his confidence. 

 

Brendon continued to glare at Dallon as the taller man quickly went over to the fridge, opening it and crouching down so that neither or the people on the counter could see him, except for his feet. 

 

He stared at the meager contents; none of them had been able to go out and get new food or fruits or whatever in a while, seeing as they were closer to being attacked every day, and shopping was a hazard now. Jon could easily disguise himself, as could Sarah and Linda (she could change her face, a sort of shapeshifting where she couldn't change form but could change aspects of her appearance), but it was too dangerous, too unpredictable. 

 

Dallon quickly grabbed a sad-looking apple, realizing that he had been staring in the fridge for too long, and he was now slightly cold. Sarah and Brendon hadn't moved, but now looked more put together. Dallon paused again, his feet directed toward the door but something stopping him from actually exiting (if this was marina’s way of telling him that he needed to apologize to both of them, it was a sick joke). 

 

“Is that apple the only thing you’re getting…?” Brendon asked, hesitantly, and Dallon nodded fractionally. The awkwardness was becoming slowly more uncomfortable by the second, and then Brendon made it worse. 

 

“Listen, Dallon, I need to talk to you,” Brendon said again, his tone steely and firm. Dallon started to panic, stepping backward and fiddling with the apple, but refusing to turn to the two people to his left, and the invisible barrier blocking him from leaving was still in place. 

 

“I don't care if you're jealous of me, or Sarah, or any other person in this place, or if you’re still angry from Breezy -” Dallon’s skin prickled from the name, and finally he felt a spike of anger, “- it gives you no right to treat everyone like shit, or to lash out at anyone, or to call anyone a shallow, gold-digging, slutty bitch.” 

 

Dallon slowly started to feel the fury creeping into his chest as Brendon parroted his words back at him, and he kept silent. There was no reason to him to be angry; if anything, Brendon and Sarah had the right to be mad at  _ him _ . And yet, Brendon was standing there calmly talking to him, and Sarah was sitting there, not meeting his eyes. 

 

He suddenly felt as if he was choking on his own air, and he gulped. Dallon finally looked at the two of them, and flinched back at Brendon’s hard gaze. It wasn't particularly angry, or disappointed, or even sad. It was calm, it was decisive, it was almost  _ sympathetic. _ The anger was quickly replaced by a gnawing, uncomfortable guilt. 

 

“I’m sorry if I did anything to make you think I’m a slut,” Sarah spoke up after a moment, her voice soft and apologetic and sad and  _ broken _ . The words hit him like a punch to the gut. 

 

“I - you - I'm sorry,” Dallon stuttered, and ignoring Sarah’s response and Brendon’s voice, he swiftly turned and left, the barrier lifted from the door. 

 

He speed-walked past Joe and Andy, past the room he had come from, down the familiar route to his designated room. He ignored the stares, the inquiries if he was okay, the few glares aimed his way. Slamming the door behind him, Dallon slumped against it.

 

The room was barren, bigger than the previous one he had lived in but sparse, cold, the cream walls marked with black marks and occasional holes from tacks. The only furniture was an unmade and messy bed, a nightstand crowded with old apple cores and empty soda cans and miscellaneous bits of trash, a small dresser that Dallon hadn't touched, instead his clothes draped in various areas around the room. He didn't care about little things like a straightened up bedroom or clean clothes anymore.

 

The cap on his own emotions seemed to pop off as soon as he stepped foot into the space, and he resolutely stopped himself from crying, instead gripping the apple so tight that his fingers pierced the skin, sinking deep into the flesh of the apple. There was, of course, envy and jealousy (they circled above his head, repeating over and over  _ dallon should've been the one who was kissing brendon, not sarah never sarah never ever ever _ , spitting venomous words toward the woman who had done nothing more than get close to the man that Dallon himself was stupidly pining over), fury (both at himself and sarah, at the fact that dallon didn't even apologize to the woman, and at the fact that she thought that she was the one who needed to apologize in the first place), and then there was guilt, the force that was choking him and making his chest constrict and his stomach churn, mixing with the two others to make his hands shake and eyes prick with tears. 

 

He refused to cry, however. He had cried too long over a woman who had faked her death to leave him. He didn't like crying anymore. 

 

Luckily, he wasn't allowed to cry. 

 

A piercing, startling alarm started to wail above his head; Dallon shot up, all emo feelings and angsty thoughts disappearing immediately. His mind raced, thinking instead of the worst (SICEA was bombing the base, or storming it, everyone was dead, he was alone, he was going to die), but he pushed them away just as he pushed open the door. Most of them were irrational, anyway -  _ maybe _ a few seconds had passed since the alarm had started, and he hadn't heard anything major going on. 

 

A crash and a few screams, terrified and helpless, came from far away. Dallon’s stomach dropped; he had spoken too soon. 

 

He started to run down the hall, soon reaching a sprinting speed; he passed multiple other running people on the way (joe, andy, patrick, ashley, marina, the such), quickly overtaking them with his long strides and swift pace. 

 

Another scream, and Dallon pushed himself to run even faster, skidding around corners and the screech of the alarm still obnoxiously loud in his ears. 

 

He reached the open space, the place where they had all walked in on that first day, and slid to a shocked stop. 

 

Maybe he hadn't been too far-fetched when he thought that SICEA was storming the base. 

 

-

 

First Sarah, then Dallon, and now the whole reason they were here in the first place, the fucking Supernatural Identification, Containment and Extermination Agency. 

 

Not that Sarah was a negative thing. She was sweet, kind,  _ not a bitch _ , and probably the nicest person here, aside from maybe Patrick or Elisa. Those two were an unstoppable force of politeness and kind acts that no one could rival. 

 

Plus, Sarah was a really good kisser. That helped a little bit, in Brendon’s humble opinion. 

 

They had been, well, making out when the alarm had started to go off. A sympathy kiss, if you will. Sarah was still broken up about Dallon calling her a slut, and how he had run out of the room before giving her a real, genuine apology (and brendon was still pissed at the tall man for that fact), and so to comfort her Brendon had given her a chaste kiss that turned quickly into multiple not-so-chaste kisses. 

 

They had sprang apart when the wail started up, Sarah’s hair mussed up and his shirt halfway off and both of their faces red, their lips swollen. One glance between them, and they started to run, pushing open the door and frantically trying to fix themselves up before they reached the arranged spot for emergencies like this; the open space at the front of the building, the only place in the building where the alarms could be activated. 

 

Brendon had a sneaking suspicion, as he messily pulled his shirt back on, that this was not a drill. 

 

And guess what!!! He was right (maybe he was precognizant like patrick or lyndsey)!!!!

 

As Sarah and Brendon slid into the open space, Brendon was almost immediately punched in the face by a figure cloaked in black; he heard Sarah yelp, and knew that she was in a similar predicament. 

 

Brendon reached for the figure. He grabbed their collar, bringing them forward. He punched the figure in  _ its _ face, discovering that it was, in fact, a man. Brendon was shoved away and barely blocked another punch. He reached around to kick the man’s feet from under him. When the man’s head hit the floor, Brendon quickly kicked at his side to make sure he was down. 

 

Billie had only done two days work on physical fighting and defense, and it was just enough; Brendon winced as he felt his nose. 

 

He turned to see if Sarah needed help (he didn't doubt her abilities, but she was much smaller and lighter than him, and brendon had difficulty dealing with his attacker), but only saw Sarah viciously kicking the figure that had attacked her, leaping away when they went limp.

 

There was a screeching noise of rubber behind Brendon, and he whipped around again to see that Dallon had unceremoniously skidded into the space, eyes wild and hair a mess and frantically looking around to assess the situation. 

 

Unfortunately, before Brendon could swoop in and tell Dallon all the shit that had happened, he was attacked again. 

 

(how rude.)

 

He was punched again, this time in the gut. Brendon doubled over, clutching at his stomach. The dude kicked at his legs, and he just barely managed to not collapse. 

 

Brendon just finished punching his second attacker when he was pulled backwards, thrown onto the ground, and a  _ gun _ was pointed at his head. 

 

That was new. 

 

The dude’s sunglasses made it hard for Brendon to focus on getting into the dude’s head, and it seemed they had been trained to block out telepathic people from their mind, but they were no Natural. After an especially violent shove into his mind, Brendon was finally able to worm his way into the dude’s thoughts, and keeping eye contact (or at least he thought he was, seriously who wore sunglasses in a fight?), he firmly thought  _ get that goddamn gun out of my face _ at the dude. 

 

There was a moment’s hesitation as the man tried to think  _ wait no that wasn’t me thinking that - _ before Brendon pushed the thought even further into the dude’s mind, and the gun was finally removed from his face. 

 

He was officially allowed to call himself Obi Boyd Urie, thank you very much. 

 

Brendon got up, and the dude was still dazed from the amount of force that had been used on his brain (brendon felt slightly guilty, as he had probably caused to some serious brain damage, or at least a bad case of alzheimer's or dementia in the dude’s later life), and so he shoved him backward, grabbing the gun as the dude collapsed without any fight. Brendon stared at the gun a moment before throwing it to the side; he never really liked guns, and he wasn’t looking to kill anyone. 

 

Brendon looked around again, seeing that pretty much all of the group was fighting, both with their powers and without - Ryan was with Dan, the geokinetic causing the concrete floor to swallow up soldiers coming their way, and the aerokinetic propelling soldiers toward the openings in the floor. Gerard and Mikey, always together by some extension, were separated for once, Gerard using the water from a stray water bottle he had found to attack people, Mikey on the other side of the room, freezing people as he punched and kicked. Dallon and Breezy seemed to be a unit for once, and Brendon was in awe of how good they worked together, backs pressed up against the other and constantly watching out for the other. Maybe if Dallon wasn’t so mad at the woman, they would’ve worked even better together. 

 

Patrick was working his magic with his soul voice, singing awkward lyrics like, “Please punch yourself in the faaaaAAaaaaAAAce,” but it was working - Brendon had to restrain himself from doing the action himself. Pete was flitting about, not in the superspeed way that Hayley was doing (there was a very visible blur everywhere she went), and not in the portal way that Kenny was (there were visible purple holes wherever kenny would pop out of thin air and punch someone randomly in the face, and then disappear to somewhere else), but in a way that Brendon very quickly saw that he was bending the time around himself to slow himself down, leisurely slapping soldiers across the face, positioning soldiers so that they could crash into each other, the such.

 

There were more and more soldiers flooding the area, and Brendon saw that all thirty of the Naturals were making quick work of them, but they were also becoming outnumbered. A burst of heat came from behind Brendon, and he realized that he had been staring at everyone fighting while there were probably people trying to attack him. He rushed forward to punch a dude that had been trying to sneak up on Billie, looking behind him to see that Spencer had burned a guy that had been sneaking up on  _ him _ ; he threw the pyrokinetic a thankful glance, and Spencer rolled his eyes before turning back to fight more fire with… fire, yeah. 

 

Brendon had never  _ really _ been in a fight before, and certainly not with a group as big as this, so it was an entirely new experience (well, he should never have to experience this, but he was basically condemned to a hard life when he was born a natural, so you know. there really wasn’t an option). He would be punched, punch someone else, be kicked, kick the person back. He would move all around, sometimes fighting with Ashley and Melanie, the next moment with Sarah, the next with Billie and Joe. He also had the feeling that Pete was speeding up the fight, as well, because it only seemed a few minutes before the soldiers were almost all gone and Brendon was very tired, hurting all over, and getting irritable.

 

“Fucking - I swear to - fucking stay down!” He snapped at the dude he was currently battling by himself, and in an act of fury he stomped downward. The dude howled as Brendon’s foot landed on his arm, resulting in a sickening crunch and immediate guilt on Brendon’s part. “Ah, sorry dude, I, uh… yeah.”

 

Needless to say, the guy remained on the ground. 

 

Panting, Brendon looked around at the open space, wincing as he put weight on his left leg (someone had brought a knife to a fistfight, and now his thigh was paying for taking on  _ that _ particular dude), absent-mindedly touching his lips, coming away with blood. 

 

Nice. His lip was split open, now he would look super cool for a while. 

 

He saw that Dallon and Breezy were taking on two soldiers at once, but as he watched, Dallon quickly sucker-punched the dude he was facing, and Breezy kicked out his legs - Dallon then reached over Breezy’s head, grabbing the second soldier and throwing him to the ground. 

 

It was done. 

 

“Ugh, what are we going to do with all these guys?” Ryan’s voice cut through Brandon's thoughts, and Brendon looked away from where Dallon and Breezy were awkwardly standing close together, strange looks on both of their faces. Maybe they would forgive each other now. 

 

The geokinetic was gingerly toeing an especially-still soldier that was close by him, and Brendon shrugged as Billie answered. 

 

“Put the dead ones outside, Josh can take care of the injured ones and then we can release them,” Billie said, and Patrick behind him made a face. 

 

“Why? Now that they know where we are, they're going to tell the other people that hey, we're here,” Lyn-z spoke, and Brendon felt himself agreeing. Even so, Josh flitted between the numerous soldiers on the ground, healing the injured ones and covering the dead ones’ faces with their jackets. Brendon started to feel sick at how many dead soldiers there were. 

 

“So they can say, ‘hey, these dudes are pretty badass, and we should wait a while before attacking them again’,” Mike answered, and Billie nodded thankfully. Lyn-z still looked doubtful, but let it go. 

 

Of course, things didn't stay triumphant. 

 

A gunshot suddenly echoed throughout the space, and Brendon jumped as the others started to shout. He could barely see the top of a (sniper? shooter?) person’s head around the corner of the hall to his left. Hayley saw the dude, too; she took off, her orange hair leaving a fire-colored streak in the air. 

 

“Dallon,” Brendon heard Breezy saw weakly, and he turned, gasping when he saw the predicament. 

 

Breezy was clutching at her stomach, and as Brendon and Dallon (and pretty much everyone in the room) watched numbly, she lifted her hand to reveal a dark red stain growing steadily. She collapsed - Dallon rushed forward, catching her just before she hit the floor. 

 

“No, no, Breezy, no, please,” Dallon whimpered, brushing away the hair from her face.

 

Brendon felt as if his feet were glued to the exact spot he was frozen (he knew he shouldn't be watching, but there was a sort of twisted part of him that forced him to remain and spectate the horror), and behind him he could hear Hayley gasping as she sprinted back into the room.

 

Dallon’s eyes were growing duller by the second, tears gathering in the corners as he stared longer at Breezy. 

 

“I… I’m sorry, Dallon, I'm so sorry,” Breezy choked out, and Brendon’s heart clenched as the dying woman started to cry softly, Dallon pulling her in closer to him (distantly brendon recognized the cliche situation, but it wasn't the time). 

 

“Shh, no, Breezy, please,” Dallon begged, and Breezy started to cry harder. 

 

“I love you, so much, Dallon, I'm so sorry,” she sobbed, trying to curl into her previous husband but gasping at the pain of the bullet in her stomach. 

 

Dallon quickly turned to Josh, who was in a similar state as most of the others in the open space, but quickly regained movement and slid over to assess the wound. Brendon saw Dallon’s jaw clench as Josh prodded at the bullet wound, Breezy consequently biting back a yelp of pain.

 

“No, I don't… please, don't… it won't do anything,” Breezy pleaded softly, and Josh paused in his probing, locking eyes with the hurt woman. A beat passed, and Josh retreated, his fingers stained red and his chin trembling as he quickly walked back to Tyler, who quickly wrapped the shorter man up in his arms. 

 

“No, Josh, what are doing? Josh!” Dallon’s voice climbed an octave, but he was pulled back by Breezy’s steadily-weakening words. 

 

“I love you, Dallon” she repeated, running her fingers over his cheek. 

 

“I - I love you too, Breezy, I love you,” Dallon stuttered, ignoring the blood on his face and leaning in to desperately kiss Breezy. 

 

Brendon turned away then, not needing to see when Breezy stilled, when Dallon pulled away from her lips and started to shake her, when his voice got higher and louder with every pleading to, “come back, please Breezy, I'm not mad at you anymore,  _ please come back”, _ when he pulled the limp body in closer to him.

 

Brendon squeezed his eyes shut as Dallon let out a heart-wrenching scream, the sound echoing through the suddenly-cold halls. 

 

**_END OF PART TWO._ **

 

|| .. / .-- .- -. - / - .... . / .-.. --- ...- . / --- -. / -.-- --- ..- .-. / .-- .-. .. ... - --..-- / --- .... / --. .. ...- . / -- . / - .... . / .... . .- .-. - / --- -. / -.-- --- ..- .-. / -. . -.-. -.- .-.-.- ||

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oops i... did it again
> 
> actually i've never written a character death, this is probably so fucking cheesy oh well lmaooooo... i tried my best to make it heartfelt
> 
> plus i'm starting on the third (and final!!!!) part, it's not very long yet and i kind of hope it's a little bit shorter than the other parts, but hey i didn't forsee this shit being 21k words long so who even knows at this point. plus ya might wanna prepare yourself, emotionally... and that's all the warning i'm giving you lolololololol... plus i'm taking a (hopefully) very small break in between these parts bc this drained me. like. a lot.
> 
> anyway, in this chapter i skipped around a LOTTTTT, like a whole lot (time-wise), so if you're halfway through and like "what the fuck is happening", please just ask me bc my mind works way faster than my fingers can type and sometimes i get ahead of myself. i am willing to answer any (and i mean any) "stupid" question you throw at me, even if its like
> 
> "um yah, why is brednon uire so fukcing uglie" 
> 
> and i'll be like "bc he is"
> 
> ... idk guys can you tell i'm winging it. please leave a review, please. i'll love you forever and maybe the third part will be three times longer and come out even faster, idk (i say idk a lot because i am very clueless, in general). 
> 
> (btw if you want to follow me on tumblr please do, my url is the same as my name on here :))

**Author's Note:**

> i have no idea when the next part will come out, as it's already around 13k and i'm only in the middle of the story. eh, i wrote 11k in a week, i can write 15k in a week and a half. maybe. this might become another slowtown trilogy where i completely abandon it and feel enormous amounts of guilt every time i see it in my google docs. 
> 
> anyway, if you want to see more of my stuff i have a tumblr (bottlefullofarsenic.tumblr.com), and please please PLEASE leave a review!! it's going to boost my writing enthusiasm by 5% each time i get a notification, and maybe i can finish up the next part in a jiffy and then start the last part!


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